Forever a Never, Till Death Do Us Part
by VociferousVixenofDarkness
Summary: Things around Titans Tower are changing, and Raven seems to be the only one to notice. What will happen if she confronts the issue? Rated T for safety. BB/Rae Rob/Star and Cy/Bee.
1. Control

**Well... here it is. The begining of my new hobby: fanfiction. And as such, I really have nothing to say .**

**Oh wait... I'm requried to say I don't own the Teen Titans... Enjoy! :)**

* * *

"Azarath Metrion Zinthos… Azarath Metrion Zintho-"

"Rae, you've been meditating for the past _three_ hours. Don't those words eventually give you a headache?"

Raven stopped her chanting, but didn't move a muscle. After a brief awkward silence, Beast Boy took the hint. Getting Raven mad was the last thing he wanted to do, though it often seemed to be the only thing he was capable of.

"Sorry. Forget I said anything" Beast Boy mumbled with his head hung in discontent as he began to leave the common room of Titans Tower.

Raven remained silent and motionless, floating in place facing the window. Although she was happy Beast Boy was actually going to leave her alone for once, she also held just enough guilt to hold off beginning her mantra again.

'Why should I feel sorry for the immature brat? He knows very well I hate interruptions when meditating.' Raven reasoned, trying to shrug off the guilt.

'But it wasn't like he was intentionally trying to bug me. I _have_ been meditating for a while. He's probably bored as all hell, and one little question is all he's asked this whole time. The least he deserves is an answer.'

Beast Boy was almost up the steps to the door to the hall when he heard a faint, but familiar voice deadpan "No."

"Huh?" He turned towards Raven's direction; half expecting he was just hearing things.

Raven didn't turn, but opened her eyes to stare at Beast Boys' reflection in the window "It's my way of focusing my energy, and relaxing. If it gave me a headache-"

"YO B!" Cyborg shouted, practically running though the doors the second they opened, and almost plowing right through his green friend.

"AHHH!!!!" Beast Boy yelped in surprise, almost hitting the ceiling before landing right in the metal teens arms. Beast Boy quickly jumped out of the embrace to face his friend with a stern face and pointing finger."Don't ever scare me like that again CY!! It's not cool." his deeper voice clearly trying to hide the fact that he had screamed like a little school girl not seconds before.

Raven, who had seen the whole incident in the window couldn't help but show a smirk on her face.

"Guess I'll inform the villains of Jump City that yelling your name is prohibited then."

"Dude! You almost ran me over!"

"Maybe you shouldn't be standing in doorways," Raven stated as she headed for the kitchen to make some tea.

Cy couldn't help but chuckle at the remark. Beast Boy on the other hand was in fumes, but couldn't find a remark as his eyes darted between his two opponents. Finally realizing that stammering was getting him nowhere, he slouched in defeat.

"Oh brighten up B." Cy said, mentally accepting and noting another win against his green friend. "Look what I managed to pick up on my way back from my da… the store".

Beast Boy gave a quizzical look at the sudden correction, but failed to care the moment he saw what Cyborg was dangling in front of his face.

"SUPER MEGA MONKEY MANIA 7?!?!?! DUUUUUDE!!!! How did you… where did you… I thought the _whole West Coast_ was sold out!!" Beast Boy, in utter shock, and giddiness snatched the game from Cyborg's hand, and eyes widening by the second, uttered "You're my hero" before running top speed for the console to plug it in.

"Hey, wait up!"Cyborg shouted to a now distant Beast Boy across the room. "I call first player!"

Raven, overhearing the conversation while waiting for her tea, had put two and two together, and before Cyborg even took a step, she directed an oddly curious-sounding monotone at him. "I take it Bee is back in town?" Cyborg froze in his tracks.

"How?..."

"A wild guess that you just confirmed". Raven couldn't hold back a devilish grin.

"C'mon Rae, that's not fair. What gave it away?" Cy was doing his best to keep the conversation only audible between Raven and himself.

Having now finished making her tea, Raven began making her way to the door. "The slipup about your date didn't help. And being from the East, she was probably the one who got that game as well. Just don't tell me that's the _only_ reason you two met up" she paused just behind Cyborg, waiting for his response.

Cy was still frozen in surprise and fear that his "secret" may no longer be a secret. He wondered if Beast Boy might have caught the connection as well, but highly doubted it. "Uhhhhh…." he managed to utter.

"Boys." Raven almost spat out, disgusted that her teammate just had his unofficial "girlfriend" drag her sorry butt across the US to bring him some stupid game.

"Rae, _pleease_ don't tell anyone. I swear, I'll do-"

"Hey CY! You coming or not man?! Afraid I'll kick your butt?" Beast Boy called from the couch.

"Whatever." Raven said monotonously before heading up the stairs and through the door.

Cy replied with a weak "Thanks" before heading over to his green friend who was still sorting out how to taunt his opponents with rude gestures. "Not before your butt is whooped, grass stain!"

Raven heard the two boys start yelling at each other as the doors shut behind her.

'Well, the silence was nice while it lasted' Raven thought to herself as she headed down the hallway to her room.

* * *

A few hours later, Beast Boy and Cyborg had finally given up beating each other to a pulp, and were now blowing through the new game on co-op.

A few floors below, the garage to Titans Tower opened up, and a bright red R-Cycle zoomed in before screeching to a halt. Both its occupants were a bit damp, and tense, but as Robin turned the motor off, the two relaxed just a bit.

"Looks like we made it just in time" Robin observed.

"Perhaps if we had left a minute earlier, we would not be as damp" Starfirereplied, as she hopped off the back of the R-Cycle. Robin gave a small chuckle at that remark.

"Yeah, that and maybe if we didn't hit _all_ the stoplights in the city, we wouldn't be racing home". The two had gone out of the city for the day, but as far as any of the other titans knew, they were just "heading out" to nowhere in particular. It was all Starfire's idea of course, but Robin couldn't say no to a few hours of fresh air and a change in scenery.

"I still do not understand why one must stop at a light for so long when there is clearly no one else at the intersection." Starfire said as she pondered the many times this had occurred on their way home.

"Me either Star, but it's the law"

The two made their way up the stairs, and headed to the common room while Star tried desperately to get her hair back in order. As the two got closer to the doors, Robin suddenly realized how late it was, and how this would look to his friends. 'Hopefully they won't notice' is all he thought as the doors swooshed open in front of them. To his surprise, the room was relatively quiet for all three of his friends occupying it at once. Usually, Cy and Beast Boy would be at each other's throats while playing games, and/or Raven would be screaming at them to shut up.

"Greetings friends!" Starfire exclaimed happily as she flew into the room, also curious as to why CY and BB were so quiet.

Raven had decided to come back down to make her last cup of tea for the night, and pried her eyes from the kettle she had been staring at to look up at a cheery Star, and slightly stiff, damp Boy Wonder.

"Hey Star. Robin. …you look… damp. Where have you been?" she searched Robins face for some clues.

"Yeah! It's like… 10! You guys have been gone for like… uh…"Beast Boy struggled with the math for a second before Raven saved him the trouble "Seven hours".

Robin was fidgeting with his cape now, trying to take it off to dry. He would let Starfire do the explanation, since it would sound suspicious coming from him. All he could do is think 'please Star, just don't make it obvious'. That's when he caught Raven staring at him.

"Oh! It was a wondrous adventure!" Star exclaimed. "Robin and I went exploring, and saw many fields of flowers, and trees, and met the most kind people I have met in a long time. The nature outside of our city is most beautiful. And the pies remind me of the glanporg of my world, which are only served on special occasions. And the air! It smells so clean! Oh Raven, Cyborg, Beast Boy, you all must experience this place outside our city! It is most Glorious!"

"It was actually kind of relaxing to tell the truth" Robin added, draping his cape over a nearby chair. "That is, until we reached the city, and saw the clouds rolling in."

"Is that why you smell like a wet dog?" Cy asked as Robin plopped down on the couch next to him, trying to play it cool.

"It's not my fault the R-Cycle isn't waterproof. Besides, we made it just in time." Robin motioned to the window, where it was clearly pouring outside the tower. He decided now would be a good time to change the subject. "So… is this a new game? I haven't seen you guys playing it before."

"Yeah man! Our buddy Cy here is the luckiest man on Earth! He's like the only guy on the whole West Coast that was able to get SUPER MEGA MONKEY MANIA 7!!" Beast Boy tried to explain as he kept one eye on the screen and mashed away at the buttons on his controller. Raven just rolled her eyes.

"But when you two usually play the videogames, you are usually yelling as to whose butt is to be whooped the most, correct?" Starfire asked quizzically, as she took her seat next to Robin.

"Yeah, but there's a new co-op mode where we can fight together against an onslaught of enemies!" Cy explained.

"So you are not doing the butt whooping to each other then?" Star found this to be very odd, considering that anytime the two played a game, they were always fighting each other.

"Nah, but the computer's totally getting its butt kicked!" Beast Boy chimed in as he took out a whole slew of enemies nearby.

"And it keeps them a lot _quieter_ too" Raven added quite dryly before she took a sip of her tea. But she felt that Robin and Star still had some questions to be answered about their little excursion.

"Soo… what made you two venture outside the city?" she asked over Robins shoulder. She could sense him tense up the very moment she finished.

"Uhh…" Robin scratched the back of his head, searching for a way to get himself out of this. He laughed nervously, "well… um… I haven't uh, really… you know… been outside the city in a while." He looked over to Star in hopes that she could possibly save him.

"I thought you two were just 'heading out' and didn't know where you were going" Raven was absolutely loving watching Robin start to crumble under her questions.

"Uh... y-yeah… well… we didn't really…" Robin stuttered as he felt Ravens eyes bear down on the back of his neck. Man was he busted.

"We were going to ride to the park, and I asked Robin if perhaps we could go see someplace new, so we headed outside the city, and found a cute little place where the people were nice, and ate the most scrumptious meal, and then explored the hills and fields and rivers" Star began relaying what had happened earlier that day. Cyborg and Beast Boy started to giggle at the last few comments.

"Robin, you just don't seem like the exploring type" Cy elbowed his friend in the ribs, trying to hold back his laughter. Robin just sat there, hoping the tormenting would end soon.

"Well, you two weren't the only ones having fun today" Raven glanced over at Cy, who immediately shot her a death glare.

"ahahaha… wait… what?" Beast Boy burst out laughing before realizing he didn't understand Ravens comment. Cy had just gone to some store, Raven had been meditating all day, and he had just sat and watched. How was any of that considered fun to her?

"Glad to hear" Robin managed to grumble, still staring at his lap with his head hung low.

Realizing that she wouldn't squeeze any more out of the 'couple', and ignoring Beast Boy completely, she turned and headed for her room. "I'm headed to bed. Try to keep it down."

"Night Rae" came Cy's voice. BB was still pondering her weird comment, but managed a "will do".

Robin finally relaxed at Ravens' words, realizing that she was finally off his back. 'I only did it to myself' he thought. 'I should've known someone would be curious. I could've just gone straight to bed, and avoided all the questions'. But he just couldn't stand the thought of Starfire answering all the questions herself, and possibly making it sound like they had gone out on some sort of… date or something. He had to stay and make sure of that.

Starfire gave out a big yawn as she slowly got up from her seat. "I think I will follow friend Raven to bed now. I am very tired."

"Yeah, I'm getting' kinda sleepy too." Cyborg said as his character was slowly overtaken by a bunch of enemies.

"Dude, don't make me have to save your butt" Beast Boy replied while trying to save his friend from death.

"BB, we've been playing for a while, and it's getting kinda late" was all Cy said as he pressed the pause button. "I think I'm done for the night".

"Aww maaaan" BB let out, a little frustrated that his friend was calling it quits. "But its not even 11 yet!"

"Sorry B, I'm tired. It's been a long day". Cy got up, and stretched before heading off to the doorway with Star. "We can finish up tomorrow" he said over his shoulder.

"But what if some bad guy is up to no good, and we end up fighting all day, and…" the green teen trailed off, realizing the doors had shut, and Cy was long gone. He gave out a grunt, and reluctantly saved the game before turning off the console. The hum it had been emitting, slowly died down, and the room became silent, apart from the rain pattering against the big windows in the room. Beast Boy looked over to the other side of the couch to suddenly realize that Robin was still sitting there, with a blank gaze into the distance.

"Helllooooo…!" Beast Boy frantically waved his arms in front of the masked face. "Earth to Robin! Come in Robin!" Robin continued to stare, absentmindedly replaying his day over in his head. He thought about how nice it had been to just relax, take his mind off of villains for a day. And of course, being alone with Starfire had been a definite plus to the experience. Her innocent laughter filled his mind as he slowly drifted back to reality. Apparently, everyone except Beast Boy had left the room while he hadn't been paying attention. 'Figures they'd all leave me with the annoying one' he thought waving the changeling out of his face.

"Well…" he said. "I need to change out of these, and then I think I'm headed to bed too" Robin felt his shirt, and found all but the waist mostly dry.

"You too?!?" Beast Boy whined. Robin gave a weak laugh as he got up to retrieve his cape.

"We've got training early tomorrow morning; you should be heading there soon yourself"

Beast Boy gave out a sigh of defeat. "Geez… I must be in a house of grandparents… everyone going to bed early and whatnot."

"People don't normally go to bed at three in the morning either Beast Boy" Robin chuckled. The two headed down the hall towards their rooms.

"I guess… " was all BB could come up with, as Robin departed to his own room. As he passed one particular room, he slowed hesitantly.

"Night Rae" He spoke softly, and finished his journey to his room at the end of the hall.

-------

Meanwhile, Raven was at the foot of her bed, levitating in her meditativestance. A soft roll of thunder came to her ears as she thought about her friends. All of this strange behavior was going on, and it troubled her to think that everyone was beginning to separate from the team. It was becoming a family that kept secrets from itself. Star and Robin going out on secret excursions, Cy sneaking out for dates with Bumblebee, and what troubled her most was Beast Boys' strange actions. The whole day he had sat, watching her, quiet as ever, and then after one remark, he gave up without so much as a word from her. This was all very strange coming from the usually boisterous and hyperactively annoying teen. 'Why?' she thought, as she swore she heard a voice outside her door mumble a goodnight.

'Beast Boy?' she asked in her head, rather than out loud as she hoped. Her eyes opened, and stared at her door as she came to a rest on her mattress. Taking the last sip from her now lukewarm tea, she got up to see if anyone was outside her door. She paused halfway, as a flash of lightning temporarily destroyed her night vision. When she reached the door, the thunder masked the noise as she slowly slid it open. Her pale face looked both ways down the hall before stepping out of her room, searching for any sign of who had stood where she was just moments before. Coming across no clues, she decided to head towards the door that conveniently hid the notorious pigsty of the house. Upon reaching the door, she found herself pausing.

'What are you doing Raven? He's fine. Just an odd day or something. Maybe he was just thinking about Terra again' she tried reassuring herself. 'No… he would've just stayed in his room if that was it. And he was being oddly sympathetic towards me. Usually thinking of Terra makes him mad at me.' At this point, Raven was unsure whether to knock, or turn around. 'Whatever it is, he's a big boy, I'm sure he can handle it himself' she gave a last attempt to convince herself to turn and leave, but found that her fist was hanging in midair, just inches from the door. A few short moments later, she found it knocking softly at the door.

Beast Boy lay on his bed, staring up at the ceiling, clearly too awake to go to bed this early. He kicked his boots off, and they landed in one of the many piles strewn about his room. His mind began to drift, but was interrupted when he heard two soft knocks at his door. Not knowing who the heck it could be, he jumped off his bunk, and opened the door to reveal a cloaked figure with a rather troubled look on her face.

"Raven?" he questioned, wondering what brought her to his room at this time of night.

There was a slight pause before she replied "Beast Boy… is everything alright?" She was still trying to find a reason to explain what she was doing and why. If not for Beast Boy, then most definitely for herself.

"Uh… yeah," Beast Boy started; confused as to why she thought something was wrong with him. He motioned her to come in, and he began walking to his desk chair. "why do you ask?" he sat down.

Hesitantly, Raven entered the room, careful not to trip over the mess strewn about the floor. "You… just seemed… quiet today. Well… until Cy came back, that is."

Beast Boy couldn't really explain it either. He knew Raven liked the silence, but for him to sit still for hours that way wasn't like him. "Just bored I guess" he finally decided, and shrugged.

"Yet, the one question you ask me all day, you didn't push? I'm not buying it. There's something more." Raven pressed as she found a seat on the bottom bunk of the changeling's bed.

"Yeah, sorry about that…." He trailed off before he continued. "I know you hate when I bug you while you're meditating. Like I said," he shrugged, "I guess I was just…"

Before he finished, a streak of lightning flashed outside, and the lights in his room went out. "…bored" he growled. Being awake with nothing to do was bad, but to have to sit in the dark with nothing to do would drive him nuts.

"Guess it's an early 'lights out'" Ravens voice came from across the room.

"Yeah, guess so" Beast Boy mumbled.

"You sure that's all it was?" Raven asked after a short awkward silence. Her hopes were that it was, but she questioned herself as to if it were really true.

Apparently her words had come out a little more hostile than she thought. "Yes Raven. I'm sure." Beast Boy confirmed, a slight aggravation creeping into his voice.

Raven took this as her cue, and got up and tried making her way through the darkness to the door before tripping over something.

"Oof" she gaveout as she landed with a thud on the floor. Beast Boy hearing it, gave out a quick chuckle.

"You OK Rae?" he got up, and began searching for her on the floor with his hands.

"Fine." She deadpanned. "You know, it wouldn't kill ya to clean your room once in a while. At least make a path or something."

Beast Boy laughed as he found her hand and helped her up. "What's the matter? Queen of darkness can't find her way around in the dark?"

"Not when the whole floor is a giant booby-trap"

"Good point. Only someone with mad skillz like me could do something like that." Raven thought she saw him strike a goofy pose as the room filled with another flash of lightning.

"Only _you_ would need skills to walk through a mess in the dark" Raven shook her head at how stupid he sounded.

A rumble of thunder occupied the next few moments as she carefully made her way to the door. "Guess I'll see you tomorrow." She took a step outside the room before turning. "…and Beast Boy? If anything's wrong,… I'll be here to talk."

"Thanks" Beast Boy smiled as he looked into her reassuring eyes. "Night Rae."

The changeling's soft, comforting tone took Raven by surprise. "Night BB" she almost whispered as she turned and shut the door behind her.

Were it any other time, he would have given her such a hard time for actually using his nickname. But at the moment, it just didn't feel right. Something special had just happened, as they locked eyes and said their good-nights. He wasn't quite sure what, but whatever it was, he liked it.

Raven on the other hand was almost completely petrified, as she stood outside his door with a blush creeping across her face. 'What just happened?' She asked herself within the confines of her head. 'Why am I blushing? Why did I say I'd be there to talk? Why did I worry about him? Why did I enter his room? Why did I knock? Why, why, why?' Her mind felt like it was strangling itself to squeeze out an answer.

'You did it because you _care_ about him, and apparently, he cares about you too.' Suddenly, she felt a tingle go up her spine, and she watched a light in the hall go black before it exploded.

"No…" she let out in a soft, whimpering whisper; a look of shock and fear written all over her face. Then, as quickly as the light had shattered, her eyes narrowed, eyebrows furrowed as ever, and she began storming off to her room.

'How could I _possibly_ like Beast Boy!?' she yelled in her head. The angry screams were so loud, they began to echo, causing her head to feel that much worse. 'He's nothing but an _Imm_ature, _Ill_iterate, Idiotic, Videogame-playing, Vegan… Freak! His only goal in life is to annoy the _hell_ out of you! The only reason you put up with him and his idiotic 'humor' is because he's on your team. _YOUR_ team. Hell, even his _old_ team didn't want him.' A flash of lightning filled the hall as she entered her room and headed for her bed, fists clenched. 'He thinks he's _sooo _badass too. "Oh, look at me! I'm a friggen T-Rex!" Pfft. All he ever does in fights is just get thrown around like a toy! And does he just land on the ground somewhere? NO! He almost always lands on one of his _own_ teammates! I mean, half of my injuries are because of that snot colored brat. _Why_, in all of Azars wrath could I _possibly_ care about him?' She slowly focused her eyes, and turned to find that most of her bedroom was covered in black, hovering inches above the ground. Books, potions, statues, and candles were strewn about the air, hanging in each of their own black auras. Taking a deep breath, she let out a sigh, and began putting things back in their places. As the cluttered air thinned out, one item in particular, caught her eye. She brought it closer.

"Well Brave…" she smirked as she grasped it in her hand. "I hope you're up for a long night of sparring."

* * *

**Hehe well, if you made it this far, you managed to put up with how I write, whether you had to endure or not. You also wasted enough time to make it worthwhile, and spend a little more reviewing ;). See how I suckered you in? xD. This could very well stand alone, but I have decided to make something more than just fluff. That being said, I'm sort of making this up as I go, so ideas are always welcome! Hope you enjoyed!**


	2. Breakfast

**Not to worry! I haz knot 4gotten mah storiez! I hate bad spelling. If you ever see any in my stories, PLEASE tell me. I will give you a virtual cookie :) As for me, over the past week, I have driven 18 hours mostly in snow to get back to college. Woot! I'm still alive! But who cares? On with the story!**

**Clarification note for BerryDrops and anyone else wondering: This story is being written as if Trouble in Tokyo didn't or hasn't happened yet, as well as Things Change just to be safe. I also want to thank her for pointing out how Starfire was speaking, because I hadn't even noticed I was doing it. Please let me know if anything in my story (not ships) is wrong or off. I will most likely fix it, or keep it in mind, because not only does it make the story better, but more enjoyable to read. **

**Guess I lied when I said on with the story... hehe. I do not own the Teen Titans. Only the ones in my head. *grins evilly* So without further ado, it's Chapter Two!**

* * *

It was early in the morning, and Robin found himself looking out one of the windows to the main room. The sky was still cloudy and grey, and a fine mist sprinkled down, forcing the Boy Wonder to stray from his usual spot on the roof. The waters surrounding the tower were calm, but grey, and as he looked out to the horizon, he could see a grey and yellow blob in the drizzle that resembled what stood as Jump City. The door behind him gave out a hiss as it parted, and he turned to find a very groggy Cyborg entering the room.

"Morning Cyborg."

"You're up already?" Cy muttered, trudging his way over to the couch, rubbing his head with a groan.

"Always am" the masked teen let out. He turned to continue staring out the window "It's my favorite part of the day."

"To each his own I guess…" Cyborg looked out over the boys shoulder at the gloomy weather outside, seemingly lost in his own thoughts.

Suddenly, Robin became curious. It wasn't like Cy to be so out of it in the mornings. "You look tired. Did you not sleep well last night?"

"Something like that" the metal teen muttered, looking down at his arm. "There must've been a power outage last night cuz my battery isn't fully charged."

Robin looked around the room and noticed he hadn't seen the electronics all blinking 12:00. "I see. Do you think you'll be ready in time for training?"

Cy gave out a yawn and stretched. "Yeah, no problem. But first I think it's time for a breakfast feast. I'm starvin" he grabbed for his stomach as it let out a loud growl.

Robin smiled. "Yeah, I could go for one too." The two made their way to the refrigerator and began scrounging for food.

"And guess what? Since Beast Boy isn't up yet, I get to make the real deal!" Cy, excited the vegan wasn't there to complain, pushed over a box of tofu to pull out a massive chunk of ham.

The two began their cooking, and after a while, the smells of a breakfast fit for a king began filling the room, slowly wafting out and making their way to the rest of the tower. Suddenly, the doors to the room swooshed open, and in rushed Starfire with a very worried look on her face.

"Friends! I am sorry, for I believe to have overslept." she looked surprised to see her two teammates in the kitchen, and not outside running the course. "I hope that I am not late for the training?"

Robin confused by what Star was saying, looked up to meet her face with a raised eyebrow. "Uh… Star? Training isn't for another two hours."

"But, my alarm clock says that it is twelve. That is the time, is it not? Training was to be at eleven, correct?." Star was utterly confused. Did they change the time of training without telling her? Or was her clock lying to her?

Hearing this, Cy smiled at Robin before turning to Star to explain for him. "Starfire, the power went out last night, which means all of the clocks are gonna say it's 12:00 until we reset them"

Starfire brought a finger to her chin, taking this in, and after a moment of thought, let out a simple "Oh." Her body visibly relaxed now that she had time to spare.

"So, anyone seen BB or Rae?" Cy asked, turning his attention back to the food he was preparing.

"I bet Beast Boy's still asleep." Robin answered. "He didn't want to go to bed last night, so he probably stayed up late reading comics or something."

"I think I heard some noise coming from Raven's room on my way here" Starfire added.

Cy chuckled. "You can always count on those two to be the slow risers."

Realizing he had nothing better to do, and knowing Cy wouldn't leave him to cook, Robin headed for the door. "I'll go get them."

----------

Knowing fully well that Beast Boy was a heavy sleeper, Robin came to the changeling's door, and knocked rather loudly. "Beast Boy, wake up."

After receiving a grumble, he opened the door and entered the room. He found the green teen on the top bunk, half his body hanging over the side. "Wake up sleepy head."

Beast Boy slowly opened his eyes, and groaned. "Whaaaaaaat" he whined.

Robin couldn't help but smile at how childish his teammate could be. "Wake up" he repeated. "Breakfast is almost ready, and I thought you'd want to eat before training."

"Duuuuude" Beast Boy sat up, rubbing his eyes and scratching the back of his head. "Why so early? It's only….." he looked at his clock. "…twelve?" Slowly he remembered the power outage from the night before. "Wait, what time is it?"

"A little past nine" Robin turned to leave.

"Awww maaan!" Beast Boy grumbled, hopping off the bunk and onto the floor.

"Listen, I'm not telling you to come, just letting you know."

"Fine" the changeling muttered, and started searching his dresser for something to wear.

"I'll see you in the main room then." Robin said, as he closed the door, and headed for another door down the hall.

----------

Reaching the door, he began to knock, but hesitated when he heard noises coming from the other side. Realizing she wasn't coming out anytime soon, he gave a soft knock on the door.

"Hey Rae, you up?" his question was answered with a loud grumble. Knowing all too well what would happen if he dared to enter the room without her permission, he just stared at her name on the door.

"Uh… you OK Rae?" he asked.

"Go away." He heard her voice through the door. Clearly, she wasn't just tired. Something was up.

"Raven?"

"What?!" her voice cut right through him as the door flew open to showcase a disheveled teen with a frazzled poofy purple mane framing her face. She clearly was _not_ in the mood.

"Uhh…" he backed away from the doorway, rubbing the back of his head. You could almost see the spikes of his hair go limp from the sight in front of him.

"Well…." she seethed. The aggravation in her glare bored straight into his soul. It had only been three hours since she came back from her mirror, and when she had tried to sleep, all she could do was toss and turn. Realizing how the scene must look, Raven wished she had just stayed quiet and never opened the door in the first place.

"Breakfast…" Robin began rather quietly, but was cut short, very, very fast.

"Not hungry." she slammed the door in his face before she even finished.

Robin knew now was not the time to go messing with her, but he couldn't leave the doorway. Instead, he reached out and placed his hand on the door, and asked in a soft, but worried tone "Is everything alright?" The answer to his question was obvious, but he didn't want to provoke Raven any more than he already had, and he wasn't about to make things worse until he had her permission to talk about it.

"Peachy." she deadpanned through the door. "I just need a shower and tea."

Robin, reading straight through her lie, was now extremely worried about his teammate. Any time Raven cut herself off from the others, it usually meant something bad was going on, and she was doing exactly that. He wanted to help, but felt hopeless knowing he couldn't do anything about it. He would die if he tried going into her room, and if he was going to bring it up, she would probably just ignore him or glare daggers at him until he left her alone. 'Face it.' he said to himself. 'When she doesn't want to talk, she knows exactly how to make people terrified to even ask.' And with that, he made his way down the hall, hoping the ensuing breakfast could help brighten up his already dreary day.

----------

She knew why she had done it. She wanted to be alone to go over it herself. But rather than letting out the truth, she covered it with sarcasm and a weak lie. Robin, of all people would know it, and keep pushing till he got his answer. It was just his nature to do so. She stood with her back to her bed, and let herself collapse onto it. Holding her hands over her eyes, and pressing them into her cheeks, she let out a tired sigh.

'Maybe it wasn't a total lie' she told herself. 'I do need a shower, and some tea will relax my nerves'. She wiped her hands across her face, and let her arms come to a rest at her sides. She stared at the ceiling, too tired to get up, yet too awake to fall asleep. 'I really should get up' she told herself, but remained motionless, letting her body heat sink into the sheets a little more. She wasn't about to go anywhere.

----------

"Well?" Cyborg turned as he heard the doors open, momentarily pausing his delicate carving of the ham he had cooked.

"Beast Boy's coming." Robin walked over to help Star set the table.

"And what of Raven?" Star asked, seeing disappointment on his face.

"She…" he paused to choose his words wisely. "said she would take her time, and to start without her."

Cy smiled. "I would've started whether she wanted me to or not."

"Who? Raven?" came a voice from the door.

"Beast Boy! You are awake!" Star shouted, and scooped him up into a friendly hug, which didn't go unnoticed by the Boy Wonder.

"Yeah, and as good as all this smells, I betcha Cyborg over here started it without me in mind." He looked at the table laid out buffet style with all sorts of meats, eggs, and dairy products. "Is any of this stuff edible for me?"

"It's _all_ edible BB, you just don't wanna eat it." Cy laughed.

Starfire interjected. "Beast Boy, I could always cook up some of my homemade zinthplor if you wish not to eat the foods containing products of animals." The room went silent as everyone cringed at the mention of Starfire's cooking.

"Actually, Beast Boy," Robin pointed to a particular plate on the table. "this plate of doughnuts and waffles I snuck past Cy and made with soy milk. And there's a plate of your tofu bacon in the microwave waiting for you to heat up." If there was one thing he knew, it was how annoying Beast Boy could be if his eating habits were ignored.

"Um. Thanks?" Beast Boy's look was priceless. He almost always had to fight to get things made special for him, and here, Robin had gone ahead and pretty much made him his own special breakfast. Without him asking. Before he even woke up. 'WhoWhatWhenWhereWhyHow...' The comeback king was at a loss for words.

"You're welcome" Robin simply stated, and reached up into a cabinet he usually paid no attention to. From it, he found a mug he thought he saw most often, and a teabag. Setting it on the counter near the stove with a kettle full of water, he left it, and made his way to the others to begin piling a plate full of "breakfasty goodness" as Cyborg put it.

Beast Boy had set the microwave, and began retrieving some soymilk from the fridge. "So… I take it Raven didn't feel like breakfast this morning?" he asked.

"Sounds like she's still a bit tired, right Robin?" Cy looked to Robin as he sat down and began shoveling down mouthfuls of food.

"Something like that" the Boy Wonder answered, taking his seat next to Star who was daintily cutting up her ham, waffles, and, oddly, doughnuts as well.

Taking a seat with his back to the stove, BB gave Star's plate an odd look, then turned to Robin whose expression read 'no clue'.

* * *

Looking over to her clock, Raven realized she had been laying for at least twenty minutes or so. She slowly sat up, and stretched.

'Well, if I'm not gonna sleep, I might as well do something' she said to herself.

Getting up and heading for her bathroom, she removed her cloak and threw it on the bed. After closing the door, and disrobing, she stepped into a steamy shower, and allowed herself to relax. She let the water beat away at her skin, and warm up her body, shedding away the cold of the night before. Thoroughly enjoying the warmth, a smirk made its way across her face as she remembered why she was the only one granted a personal bathroom connected to her room.

---

She had woken up very early one winter morning, and couldn't find it in her to fall back asleep. Getting up and throwing the warm cocoon of covers off of her, Raven decided it was time for a shower, and grabbed a towel out of her closet. Still tired and cold from leaving the warmth of her bed, she thought about the long, freezing walk to the other side of the tower to get to the bathroom. Overcome with laziness, she readied herself to teleport there. 'It's too early for anyone to be up yet' she subconsciously thought, and phased through her floor. Big mistake.

The moment she materialized in the bathroom, she came face to face with a bright red Boy Wonder.

"AH!" she yelled, throwing her arms up to cover her eyes.

"AH!" he almost fainted.

"AH!" she quickly turned, but the magazine covering his lap caught her attention.

"Is that… one of Starfire's magazines?" she asked.

Robins eyes went so wide, his mask looked like it was about to rip trying to conceal them. "N-n-no."

"Then who else in this tower would get a Victoria's Sec-..." realization set in. "Oh my god." She quickly phased through the door and into the hallway, her face beet red despite all of the blood draining from her body. She had just walked in on her team leader mast-… no. She couldn't even bring herself to think it; she was in so much shock.

Knees weak, she fell to the floor, and scolded herself for not teleporting _outside_ the bathroom and knocking first. 'You _idiot_! You should know better than that! And look what happened as a result! You'll never be able to look at him the same!"

A month later, after many meditations to rid her mind of the mental images, some awkward conversations, and dealing with Cyborg in her room, Raven had her own bathroom attached to her bedroom, and the two swore to never mention the incident again.

---

She had to admit, the end result was very enjoyable, yet despite not really seeing anything in particular, she found herself definitely not wanting to be in that sort of situation ever again. She remembered how he had come out after her, trying to cover for himself, saying 'It's not what you think!', though clearly she wasn't buying it. Once he realized that it wasn't working, he actually got down on his knees and begged her to never say anything to anybody. Robin. Begging. Of all the people you would expect, he certainly _wasn't_ the begging type. Even though the last thing she wanted to do at that moment was to look at him, that was a sight she would _never, ever_ forget. And of course, he was willing to do anything in his power to 'fix' it, if that was even possible, so she simply asked for her own bathroom, and got her wish. There were some complaints from the others, and a few questions as well, but between her and Robin, they could get what they wanted without revealing much of anything. Cyborg was the only 'lucky' one ever allowed to work on the project since it involved _someone_ having to go in her room, but she put up with it, and had some fun in the meantime scaring the shit out of Cy whenever she could.

Feeling clean and refreshed, she turned the water off, took a step out of the tub, and reached for her towel to dry off. When she finished drying herself off, she wrapped the towel around herself, and opened the door, allowing the steam to come billowing out into her room. She made her way to her closet, and got dressed, but the moment she turned to leave, she caught a glimpse of her mirror laid out on a shelf, and her mind, which had become nice and relaxed, suddenly brought itself back to the chaotic state of the night before.

"Ugh, and I was feeling so much better" she moaned, realizing that today was going to be a _very_ long day.

* * *

"Alright y'all, time for 'ol Cy to charge up so he can kick ass on the course today" came a voice from the main room as Raven neared it, and opened the door. Cyborg was just a few feet in front of her.

"Well well," he said, looking down at the cloaked teen who was still eyeing the floor. "If it isn't my favorite little dark queen." She couldn't help but cheer up at the comment, knowing he meant no harm. "D'ja wake up on the sunny side of the bed this mornin'?" he laughed. At this, she realized what he was getting at, and she raised her eyes to meet Robin's. He shrugged, and his eyes seemingly tried to tell her that he was forced to say _something_ to the team.

"I didn't get much sleep last night if that's what you mean," she replied to Cy, and pulled her hood over her head to signal she didn't feel like talking about it.

"Awww, poor Ravey wavey afraid of the nasty old lightning?" came a very exaggerated remark from Beast Boy. Robin and Starfire stopped eating, and Cy visibly cringed as the room fell silent, awaiting the changeling to go flying in some way or another. Surprisingly, Raven just stood there, face masked by her cloak.

Taking a moment or two to reel in her emotions, she continued her glare at the boy, and let out a growl. "_You,_ of _all_ people, should know I'm not afraid of lightning."

Realizing his comment wasn't said at a good time, he sunk in his chair with his hands waving in front of him. "Whoa, chill out Rae, it was just a joke." The rest just gave him a 'you're lucky she didn't kill you' look.

"So, uh Rae, there isn't a whole lot left to eat," Cy said, gesturing to the practically clean table that had once been piled with food. "Is there anything you want me to whip up real quick for ya?" She walked over to the refrigerator, and pulled out an apple.

"I'll be fine" she said in a monotonous voice as she held it up, and closed the door.

"Suit yourself" Cy shrugged, and headed off to go recharge. Raven walked over to the stove to fill up the kettle, and fix herself some tea. She picked up the kettle, to find it full, and realized her favorite mug had a teabag in it sitting next to her. She paused for a second, then turned the stove on to heat the water. She understood what was going on. This was Robin's way of telling her he wasn't finished, and still wanted to talk, without actually telling her.

She knew he cared for her like family, and appreciated the gesture, but… she looked over to him as he gave a slight nod and smile. Was it more? Memories of the night before began flooding her head again, causing a slight headache. She looked down to find a small ripple of black energy crawl its way down her arm before sparking into nothing at the end of her fingertip. 'I really need to meditate' she told herself, as she caught a glimpse of Beast Boy turning in his chair to take a look at her. Starfire got up to clean her plates off.

"So Raven…" BB was still a little cautious after his last comment. "you ready to take on the training course? You'll have to be on top of your game if you wanna beat _my_ time" he puffed out his chest, and poked it with his thumb. Being on top of her game wasn't going to happen today, but it wasn't like she needed to be.

"I could beat your time blindfolded with an arm tied behind my back" she let out in her usual tone. The others let out a giggle.

"I do believe Raven is right" Starfire said, "you have never beaten her time."

"Yeah, well, I've been working out lately" he reached up and flexed his scrawny arm for effect.

"Working out your thumbs playing stupid videogames?" Raven said as she raised an eyebrow.

"Yeah Beast Boy," Robin cut in before the jokester could give a response. "I haven't seen you in the rec room lately. That _is_ where all the workout equipment is, you know…"

The changeling gave him an angry look. "You don't need _equipment_ to work out either."

"It certainly helps" Robin stated dryly.

"So what… You've been doing sit-ups on the couch while none of us were looking?" Raven took a bite of her apple, and turned the stove off before pouring the hot water into her mug.

"Something like that…" Beast Boy grumbled, feeling defeated by all his teammates, he crossed his arms. "…you'll see."

* * *

Eleven o'clock came around faster than Raven had hoped. When she had finished her apple and tea, she took her place in front of a window, and took a look out at the cloudy sky and mud covered area they were going to be on in a while. It had stopped raining, but things would still be a wet mess out there. Brushing the thought aside, she crossed her legs, closed her eyes, and levitated in place. She tried meditating, but as hard as she concentrated, it wasn't enough. Part of it was a slight headache, but it was mostly because she could feel the stares of both the Boy Wonder and Beast Boy pricking at her back. Her mind was a mess, and though she tried to clear it, she didn't get very far at all.

"C'mon guys, time for training" Robin called as he headed for the door. "I'll get Cy, and meet you guys down there." She could hear a chair move as Beast Boy got up from his seat.

"You sure you still wanna train? I mean, it's still wet out there." The changeling never liked training, and always tried to find a way out.

"Doesn't matter Beast Boy. Villains aren't going to stop wreaking havoc just because there's a little rain. Neither should you." Robin ended with a fist in his hand. For drama of course.

"Worth a shot" he shrugged as he piled his plates in the sink. Raven had made it to the door where Starfire was waiting for him to join them.

"Afraid you won't beat me because of a little mud?" Raven allowed a small smile on her face.

"You wish" he responded, and quickly flew over to her as a hummingbird, landing on her shoulder.

"Get off…" she started, but was too late. A ripple of black energy had made its way to her shoulder, and knocked the teen off before she had even realized it.

"Fine." he rubbed his head. "You don't have to be so pushy ya know." He shifted, and hopped up into Starfire's hands as a cat. She giggled as he purred when she stroked him. Raven just shrugged it off, and followed the two down to the front door of the tower.

'Let's just hope that after this, I can go back to my room and meditate' she mumbled in her mind.

* * *

**I want to thank all my reviewers for taking their time to review. (I'm glad you like it!) It lets me know that there _are_ people reading my story. That doesn't mean I don't know about you others favoriting and whatnot :P. But I do like to hear from my readers (good or bad). Remember, _you_ are the people I am writing this for. Knowing what you like or dislike will let me know what step to take next. So Read, Review, Favorite, Alert, or all or none, whatever your heart desires, and I'll see you next time! :) ~VVoD**


	3. Bad Memories & Nevermore

**Hehe it's the next installment! Yay! Uhh... yeah... alot of Raven in this one. I'm not sure if thats good or bad, lol seeing as how I need to get more Rob/Star in somewhere. Believe me, its coming! I just have to think it up first! ;) Other than that, Enjoy!**

**Sadly, I do not own the Teen Titans. But if I were Control Freak, and went back in time... perhaps they would be real, and _no one_ would own them! Muahahaha.**

* * *

Raven looked out over the muddy island as the door to the Tower opened. She stood composed, but a chill went down her spine, remembering her fight with Terra. Ever since then, she never looked at mud the same. She hovered over to a seat at the course's control panel, watching her mind replay the days when Terra had been a part of the team.

She never really cared for the girl, and the two would always bicker, yet despite her wishes, the rest of the team took the earthmover in as one of their own. She remembered the fights, and the one-upmanship that constantly ensued. She always thought that it was because she was jealous of how easily Terra had been accepted by the others, or perhaps how easily the girl had been able to rein in control of her powers. But considering her conversation last night, she thought of what her emotions had said, and suddenly she found herself wondering.

'Was I jealous because of her and Beast Boy?'

She looked to the green changeling, now a pig, rolling around in the mud as Robin climbed up to the seat next to her. 'Suits him well' she thought, allowing a smile beneath her hood. Then her mind switched back to Terra.

'It doesn't matter. She was still a traitor, a liar, and a good for nothing spy. All she did was bring this team false hope and pain. Robin should've listened to me when I didn't trust her.'

But she found herself guilty of eventually accepting the rogue titan as one of the team as well. Inwardly, she sighed. 'We gave her too many chances, and we all suffered. To think she had the _nerve_ to try and win Beast Boy back before her last breath…'

Even in her own mind, those words didn't seem right to come out of her mouth. Terra had saved them all, defeated Slade (for the meantime), and stopped the town from being destroyed from a volcanic eruption. She knew how much Beast Boy had cared for her. How much he had hurt when he realized she would be gone forever. It made the worst part of being an empath fully noticeable, as she could feel the waves and waves of suffering coming from the boy for weeks after the incident, not to mention the others. She lowered her head. She remembered how he had blamed it all on her, for finally getting her wish, and how much it had stung to see him infuriated with her.

---

"_There_ Raven," he scorned between sobs. She had been following him to his room after the incident. "she's gone." He turned to face her, watery eyes aglow with hatred and contempt, "You _finally_ got your_ wish_" and with that, he slammed his door in her face. Never, had she been so taken aback in her life. The large clump in her throat from the situation swelled even more, making it even harder for her to breathe. She had never felt so low and empty, for she would never expect to wish for anyone's death, let alone be the source of one of her best friend's pure, unadulterated, hatred. His face and piercing eyes burned into her mind even after the door hid them away, and his words never did leave her conscious.

---

'Maybe they were right' she said. 'Maybe I do love him.' She looked up to find Starfire at the starting line, and the countdown initiated. She glanced over at Robin.

'But that still doesn't explain-'

"So, you're mad because you had a bad dream about Terra?" he looked over, searching her face for any answer or clue he could find.

She slowly turned away. "Not now Robin" her voice was stern, serving its intention. He must've still been searching hard for a reason for her actions this morning, and apparently sensed her thinking of Terra from their residual mind connection. He turned his attention to the course, and began pushing buttons on the panel in front of him.

"Listen, we all went through the same-"

"It _wasn't_ her" she snapped, cutting him off. Despite his attempts to help calm her, they were only achieving the opposite. For one, she didn't want to be bothered, yet he kept pushing. Two, he was talking about something _completely_ unrelated, and sore, and three, all of them had been affected differently. _None_ of them had gone through the _same_ pain and suffering Terra left in her wake. The fact that he _couldn't_ tell that, showed just how ignorant he was of his own teammates.

"Then if it wasn't-"

"Robin." her voice threatened in a low growl "now is _not_ the time" her magic pulled his cape tight around his neck to show just how much she meant it. "I _don't_ want to talk about it."

His eyes had widened, and he began grabbing for the cape around his neck, fear clearly written in every form across his face. He had stepped over the boundary, and if he didn't stop while he was ahead, this was only the beginning of what was to come.

She let go just as Starfire made it across the finish line. If _that_ didn't get the point across, who knows how far he would push to get his answer. She really didn't want to begin thinking of the consequences that would arise if he pushed much further. Her powers were already acting sporadically. Quickly soothing herself, she watched the rest of the team give Star high fives, and Cy take his spot at the starting line.

The Boy Wonder, still surprised at how physical Raven had gotten over the issue, took one last bold move. He spoke.

"Look, I just want to help. If not for the team, then for a friend."

"_I know_ Robin…" she almost sighed it out. "I know. And as much as you may not want to trust me to deal with things on my own, I ask that you please, just this once, _listen_."

Hesitantly, he gave her a nod. It went against every fiber of his being, but he knew the limits had been set.

"Yo bird brains! You gonna start this thing or what?" yelled Cyborg, snapping both Robin and Raven back to the rest of the world around them. The masked teen gave Cy an angry look before pressing a button on the panel in front of him.

Raven simply closed her eyes to meditate, trying to focus herself before she would have to run the course herself. She never said a word out loud, but simply levitated in place, chanting her mantra in her head instead. 'Azarath Metrion Zinthos… Azarath Metrion Zinthos…' Her mind quickly reflected back to the encounter in her mirror. If she was going to start bringing herself back to order, this was the place to start.

* * *

Still fuming over Beast Boy, and their encounter, Raven grasped the mirror with her long, slender fingers, and held it up to look at her reflection. A few moments later, she found herself traveling through the familiar vortex into her mind. Upon reaching the end, she slowly hovered down to a large rock that seemed suspended in the middle of nowhere.

"It's YOU!!!" came a shrill screech of delight behind her, before she found herself wrapped in an embrace that had a strong chance of putting Starfire's hugs to shame.

"Of course it's me." Raven deadpanned, trying to wriggle free of Happy's arms. "Who else would be here?"

"Well, if you let them, I'm sure your friends-"Happy thought, breaking the hug to rub her chin.

"They aren't allowed" Raven reminded the emotion.

"What about that one time-"

"Cyborg and Beast Boy went snooping in my room, and wound up here without my permission" Raven's anger at the green boy only grew as she remembered what he had done.

Her pink cloaked emotion grew a wide smile "And they were having fun until _you_ showed up, and Rage got all pissy. Besides, I kinda liked BB here. He's kinda cute."

"They were not having-" Raven took a double take. "Did you just say BB is cute?"

"_Kinda_ cute, if you wanna be all specific like Knowledge and stuff" she giggled. "C'mon Raven, you know you think he's cute toooo" her smile grew wider, as she started poking Raven in the arm, hoping to bug an answer out of her. Raven on the other hand just grew even more angry, finding that one of her emotions liked the changeling that had been the reason she had come here in the first place.

"Far from it." she spat out. "Now, where's Brave, I need to-"

"Oh." Happy interrupted.

"Oh what?" Raven wasn't in the mood for games. It was late as it was, and there was a lot of fighting still to do if she was going to release all this anger before sunrise.

"Well," she started slowly, "Brave told me to tell you that Knowledge told her to tell everyone to tell you that-"

"Tell me what? Spit it out already." This was strange. Knowledge wanted to get a message to her, but instead of seeing Raven herself, she was relying on another of her emotions to get it to her.

"Well, you see… we all sorta-"

"_She_ wanted you to have a chat with everyone." A flash of yellow appeared from under the archway to Raven's left. "But apparently things only get done when you do them yourself."

Raven looked up to the dorky version of herself, those all knowing eyes behind round spectacles. "Why? What's going on?"

The emotion floated over to the two, her face steady. "You'll find out soon enough." Happy tried to hide a giggle, knowing what Raven was about to find out. "Happy, go take your place. Raven, follow me." Doing as she was told, the cheerful emotion skipped through the archway, leaving Knowledge staring at a hesitant blue-garbed teen.

"Is this about…" Raven realized it could be a number of things from the team, to her actions, to confusion, to… "Beast Boy?" her words came out half broken, half question, and half shocked she was actually mentioning it as a possibility. Knowledge only half nodded, more as a signal to follow than an answer, and turned, disappearing under the archway.

Raven took a step towards the door, and followed. What she found on the other side, despite already being told, surprised her. Every emotion was found sitting in a half-circle, awaiting her arrival quietly. Even Rage was there, behaving without any of the others having to keep her in check.

Knowledge levitated by her side, also staring at the rainbow of colors before them. "We need to talk."

One of the emotions began to rise, her cloak a dark green. "It seems we all" she gestured to the group, then pointed to Raven, "_including_ you, are falling in love." Raven stood stunned. All the anger she had built up before she entered the mirror was now completely gone. What replaced it was the cold chill of fear. "But the problem is that none of us agree with who".

Ravens pupils shrank, nothing really registering after the word she practically forbid _herself_ to say was spoken. She had even made it common to refer to her emotion as Affection rather than... the 'L-word'.

"No…" she weakly breathed out, and with her breath, went her vision, as she passed out. Luckily, Knowledge was ready, and caught the falling teen before she fully collapsed on the ground.

From what Raven remembered, she woke up a while later to the words of an emotion she rarely ever heard speak up.

"W-we shouldn't have t-told her. It w-was a b-bad idea."

"Oh, shove it wobble knees, she's fine. It's too bad Knowledge caught her. If there were any blood, you'd be gone."

"Leave her alone Rude. Just because you're nasty doesn't mean you have to be nasty to others."

"Uh… yeah, I do"

"ENOUGH!!!" came the demonic voice only fitting to Rage. Raven opened her eyes to see an identical face wrapped in pink staring back at her. 'Great' she thought.

"She's awake!" Happy yelled, and quickly wrapped Raven up into another bear hug.

"Let… Go…" Raven pleaded, straining for air. The emotion quickly let go, and Raven propped herself up on one arm. As her vision slowly came back to focus, she rubbed her head, and looked over at the rest of her emotions still relatively unmoved from their horseshoe.

"So… it wasn't a bad dream" her monotone voice quickly grabbed the attention of any that had their minds elsewhere.

"Nope," came a voice from behind her, belonging most likely to Knowledge.

"I t-told you she w-wouldn't like it" Timid slowly backed away from the group, as if trying to hide in a corner somewhere.

"I- I just-" Raven began.

"Didn't think you could truly love someone?" Interrupted a violet-cloaked version of herself. A smirk could be found on a few faces throughout the room, but the biggest belonged to one covered in dark burgundy. Small strips of black lace, and gold facets trimmed the usual cloak, showing the emotions' unequivocal taste in luxuries.

"Where did this all come from?" Raven asked, still a bit groggy, as she slowly straightened herself to sit facing the group. "I mean, why now? With no warnings?"

"Oh, there were warnings alright". The seductive voice of Lust immediately caught Raven off guard. She almost forgot about Love's split when she had concentrated on the emotion too much while Malchior had her melting in his hands. "But like me, you managed to keep brushing them aside, and thinking of them otherwise."

"Yeah," Happy hopped in to the conversation. "and once we realized those warnings, we all realized we liked the boys more than just friends-"

"We realized that we were in love with them" Love finished, the sparkle in her Amethyst eyes matching her cape.

"_Them?" _Raven demanded, "who's _them_? I still have no clue _who_ you're talking about, or how I'm even in love if I have to be told by someone else. And yet you're saying I love not one, but _two_ or more people?"

"Well, duh…" Rude gave a playful slap to the back of Raven's noggin, though it was _not_ accepted well at all. "Weren't you listening when Brave said that we didn't agree on one specific guy?"

Raven glared at the orange emotion. "It must've slipped my mind" she quipped. The place went silent for a few moments, until she realized they were waiting for her to say something.

"So…. what. You want me to tally up votes or something and ask the winner out… on like… a date?" the last part came out awkward, since she really didn't know what to do even if she _was_ in love with someone.

"Depends on who's side you wanna be on, since you'll have to deal with the sore losers" Rage smirked, trying to intimidate Raven to take her vote into more consideration.

A hand found its place on Ravens shoulder, and she didn't bother looking to see whose it was. "The decision is ultimately yours, Raven. Each of us only stands here to state our personal opinions of whom _we_ love most." Raven sighed, still not believing the scene unfolding before her.

"Well then…" she lifted her head after a short moment of thought, "let's hear it". The moment she finished the sentence, all but Timid jumped up and rushed over to her, yelling out who they apparently loved. Nothing could be made out over the high-pitched squeals and threats of the group of girls practically piling themselves on top of poor Raven.

Suddenly, a black dome expanded out around her, forcing her emotions to be thrown away, and scatter about the ground around her. "QUIET!!!"

Raven looked at all the faces staring at her. Timid had taken to curling up in a ball, covering her face, and tightly wrapping herself in her cloak. Anger smiled, feeling more power course through her, but the rest just looked back in surprise. Hadn't she just told them to tell her their love interests? Silence hung in the air.

Raven calmed herself before she spoke. "Let's try this again. In a more… _civilized_ manner". She watched as her emotions got up, and dusted themselves off.

"Alright then." She let her eyes search for pink in the crowd. "Happy, I take it you _love_ Beast Boy?" she took to making the word sound like Happy was mistaken for how she really felt.

"Yep!" she squealed, and went into a giggling fit. "He's so funny!"

Ignoring the emotion, she addressed the rest of the crowd. "Anyone else feel the same for the green pain in my-" she stopped mid-sentence as almost half the emotions raised their hands. Shocked at the amount of emotions that apparently loved the one she thought she hated, she simply buried her face in her hands.

Taking a deep breath, she continued. "Okay… all of you stand over there" she pointed somewhere off to her left. Rage, Happy, Rude, and Love took their places. Raven quickly tried to make sense of why they liked him. Rage must have liked him because he made her angry, Happy liked his jokes and stupidity, Rude, his horrible habits, but Love she didn't quite understand. Deciding to worry about it later she continued.

"Um… Brave. Who do _you_ think you love?" she asked the green emotion.

Puffing her chest out, Brave replied "Robin of course". Finding this embarrassingly stupid to be splitting her emotions into factions of who they loved, when she clearly didn't feel anything for the men in discussion, Raven rolled her eyes, and played the part of game-show host.

"Alright. All the Robin lovers come on down" she pointed to a spot on her right, her sarcasm visibly irritating those who walked towards her. Happy let out a giggle. Brave had been followed by Knowledge. Sadness, cloaked in brown, took a step in the direction, but hesitated for a second, apparently not wanting to leave Timid's side. When she finally took her place, she muttered a sob.

"We already lost." Her eyes began to water, and Raven realized that perhaps pitting the emotions against each other might not have been a good idea after all.

"I guess I'll make a spot for Cyborg" came a voice from the remaining three. It came from none other than the light purple emotion of Friendship, who also had split from Love. Rude scoffed.

"You only like him cuz he's a good friend, and you're friendship. C'mon, who do you really _love_" she waggled her eyebrows, trying to sway the girl to think twice.

Knowledge cut in "let her stand for what she believes. The opinion counts, not the amount of people in agreement over it." Friendship scratched her head, and gave a look at Raven before replying to Rude.

"Perhaps you are right. I like Cyborg a lot, but on second thought…" she levitated over to Brave and the gang. "I find Robin the one I _admire_ most." Rude rolled her eyes, sighing in defeat. The score was now tied, leaving two emotions unaccounted for.

"So… what if we don't really care who we love most?" Lust sauntered up to Raven, a seductive smile painted on her face. The rest of the emotions sighed, and Brave let out a "you would". Raven knew what the emotion was getting at, and it disgusted her to know she was a part of her mind.

"Pick. One." Raven glared up at the emotion standing in front of her, just now realizing the cloak was made of velvet. She wished there was a way to get rid of Lust altogether.

"Well then…" Lust did a quick turn, letting her cloak brush across Raven's face, "I guess I'll try my hand at taming the Beast" she called over her shoulder, as she walked to Beast Boy's group. She ended her display with a devilish grin and a wink that left Raven hating her even more. This left Timid standing alone in the center of the two groups, huddled with her head hung low, staring at her feet.

"What about you Timid?" Raven asked as gently as she could, trying to hide her anger over Lust. The grey emotion looked up, and fidgeted in place, her arms still held in a self-containing hug.

"I- d-don't want to choose. N-none of them will like me if I p-pick sides" she let her head drop again, feeling all eyes fall on her. Raven should've seen this coming. Timid would never confess to something, especially in front of anyone besides her.

"You can whisper it in my ear if you want. I won't tell anyone" Raven put out her arms, motioning the emotion to come closer.

"B-but, you don't w-want us to lo- li-like people." She stepped back cautiously, hoping Raven wouldn't be mad she almost said love.

"Yeah, well I guess it's a little late for that, isn't it." Raven got up, and tried to calm the emotion down. Taking a second to look back at the others, she took a mental note, and sighed.

"Unless there's something else I need to know about, I've got what I need. You can go back to your quarters now." Some looked relieved, and quickly left, while others hesitated, wishing to know who would win in Ravens mind, or if she would just blow it off altogether. They all made their way through different archways, and once Raven walked with Timid under a set of archways to her own room, the common area of Raven's mind became empty and silent, as if nothing had just taken place.

Eventually, Raven got her answer out of Timid, after a lot of promises and reassurance. With a quick goodbye, she found herself back in the common room pacing around, and eyeing each archway. She decided not to go to Knowledge, simply afraid of straight facts showing her what she didn't want to believe to be true. Friendship would be out of the question for now, since her 'sister' Lust would be around, and Love would be all gushy. Sadness, Timid and Rude wouldn't be helpful by any means, and that left three doors. Happy, Brave, and Rage. Happy would probably annoy her, and Rage might try taking advantage of her weakened mental state. That led her back to the emotion she had originally come for… Brave.

After walking swiftly through the first archway to Brave's realm, she found the emotion not in her quarters, but in front of her, attacking a punching bag much like Robin would do to waste time. The emotion caught sight of Raven, and paused, before returning to her attacks.

"So. What did poor miss pity me have to say?" Brave asked between grunts of exertion. Being the opposite of the one in question made her demeanor that much less appealing.

"Actually, I'm not at liberty to tell. I made her a promise." Raven hoped the emotion would still be in the mood to talk, seeing it was her last chance to get some answers. Brave stopped her punching, and scoffed.

"Figures. She probably picked Beast Boy, and didn't want me on her case. Or to feel she betrayed her friend Sadness."

"Well, you really shouldn't be on her case anyway. Even though the two of you are what you are. Besides," Raven plopped down on a green bean bag chair she found nearby, "it's just an opinion. What does it matter? What if I don't even care? I certainly don't understand why I'm supposedly 'in love' with an annoying green bean, or someone who calls himself 'The Boy Wonder'."

"For one," Brave stood in front of Raven, hands on hips, with a very serious look on her face, "it _does_ matter. And _two, Raven, _you should care. Whether or not you want to believe it, we are your mind. We reflect how you feel, and if _we_ feel we love someone, that means _you_ love them too; despite your apparent stubbornness."

"I- I, I am _not_ being stubborn!" Raven launched herself up in anger, coming face to face with the emotion. It was a rarity for her to be struggling with words.

"C'mon Raven. You and I both know what happened before you decided to come here. It happened because you have feelings for him, and more than just feelings as a friend" she paused, letting it sink in while Raven continued struggling for words.

"Who do you think was responsible for making you knock on his door?" Raven froze. It all made sense, but that didn't mean she liked it one bit. Brave turned away, finding the discussion finished for now.

"Y'know, I would've picked him if he was a little braver once in a while. It's a real shame, seeing how green is my favorite color" Raven couldn't hold back. A black stream of energy came square with Brave's back, who was completely unprepared for the attack.

"I DON'T LOVE HIM!!!" Raven yelled out. Brave recovered from her tumble from being hit with the attack.

"_I_ didn't say you did" she readied her defenses, awaiting another strike. "But I guess that means Robin has a better shot" Raven, now getting madder by the second, let out an angry scream as she focused another blast at Brave, who put up a barrier to block it.

"I-" Raven started throwing balls of dark energy at her emotion, who took part to dodge or block all of them with small fields of her own energy.

"Don't-" her voice began to crack.

"I-" the balls grew smaller, and less steady.

"can't-" she fell to her knees and stopped. Brave decided to watch from a distance, just in case. Raven had her hands grasping her head as if she had a massive headache. Slowly she looked up to the emotion, and Brave saw the Titan's eyes. She didn't like it, but kept quiet. They were moist, and a small stream had made its way down Ravens left cheek.

"I don't… I don't know how…" Raven sputtered, trying her best to hold back everything. This wasn't like her. She was supposed to be strong. In control. But these apparent… crushes had her dealing with surges of emotion all over the board. Most of it had to do with trying to fight herself against it, but it also came from not knowing if or how the others would react even if she acknowledged it. Brave spoke up, clearly wanting to leave the sight in front of her.

"Grow a pair and just do it. The sooner it's over with, the sooner we won't all be at each other's throats." And with that, Brave, headed for her room.

Raven remembered lying there for hours, going over everything in her head. Sure, there were still questions, but she didn't feel like asking them. Hell, she didn't even want to get up from the floor and move. Eventually she did though, and left the mirror with her head still spinning in chaos.

* * *

"Uh… Rae…" she felt a very slight tug at her cloak, which brought her out of her meditation. She peeked open an eye to her right, and saw Beast Boy where Robin had been before.

"What?" she asked calmly, opening her eyes to notice her legs rippling in her energy. Luckily, the only way the others could see it was if they had been looking up her cloak, which even for Beast Boy, was very unlikely.

"Robin's almost done" the changeling said, eyes still watching Robin, whist pressing buttons on the control panel. It was perhaps the only piece of machinery he had managed to learn how to use correctly in Titans Tower, besides the Gamestation. Robin crossed the finish line, and Beast Boy looked up to Raven with a giant grin on his face.

"You're next" he said, and reset the timer.

"Oh fun" she deadpanned. "and what time of yours do I have to aim for?" she saw his grin grow even wider.

"The new course record." Raven just stared at the green boy as he kicked his feet up, and folded his arms behind his head, gloating. "Think you can beat it?"

Raven looked at the screen. Sure enough, ranked at the top was Beast Boy, with a time of 3:19.52. Mentally, she cursed herself for missing it in action.

"Anything's possible" she shrugged, hiding her astonishment. She levitated behind her chair, and stood up, deciding to walk to the starting line instead of using her powers. She was afraid it might blow her cloak around, revealing the ripples on her skin if she did. Hopefully they would dissipate before she started. Unfortunately, Beast Boy pressed the countdown timer as soon as she reached the line, making her grimace.

"Dear Azar," she sighed, "let's just get this over with."

* * *

**I agree Raven, I agree. The boys just won't get off your back. So, will Raven beat Beast Boy's time? Will Robin learn to shut up once in a while? Will Raven choose a guy, or blow it off? (yay conflicting emotions!) Will Raven be able to control her powers? You might think you know, but even I don't! Thats the fun of writing this on the fly. It also lends itself to guesses and what ifs (hint, hint). ;) **

**Oh jeez. Someone's gonna kill me for making Raven violent and possibly love Robin. Not to worry! I accept flames wholeheartedly! Just remember, the description says BB/Rae, so... I can't go back on my word, now can I? Or could I? *evil grin* Hopefully there will be more fun next chapter, so until then, I bid you adieu. And since you already read, please review! xD.**

**~VVoD **


	4. Troubled

**Alright everybody, I introduce to you: Chapter Four! It's title? Troubled. As in what I'll be if I wait too much longer to update. Why did I name it Troubled you ask? You'll just have to read to find out! **

**On the bright side though, I have found a new and trusty Beta! He goes by the name of Novus Ordo Seclorum, and you should definately check out his story Collateral Damage. It's has a very immersing plot revolving around Beast Boy and a certain Boy Wonder we've all come to know. Our changeling might possibly be dead, and Robin will have to make a decision over his buddy or Slade. Will he throw his friend away to chase an old foe? Or give up a promising lead to make sure every member of his team is safe? I'm telling you, it's intense! Check it out. You know... _after_ you read mine of course. :P Enjoy!**

**Disclaimer: The Teen Titans aren't mine. I don't own them, and probably never will. :(**

* * *

Robin caught his breath as he climbed up to the control panel and sat in the seat previously occupied—rather, hovered above—by Raven. He had been fighting to stay on his feet the whole time, trying not to slide in the mud while running the course. As a result, his time had suffered; but training was training and unfamiliar circumstances needed to be played out as well. He looked over to the changeling beside him, amazed at how well the mud had helped the boy. It helped so much in fact, that he now held the course record. That, or it was that 'working out' he had supposedly done.f

Robin laughed to himself. 'He's just used to never being on his feet'.

"Maybe she won't beat you this time" He grinned at the boy, then turned to Raven at the starting line.

"Yeah," laughed the green boy, pressing the countdown timer. "No one believed me."

"Well, she certainly has her hands full" Robin kept his gaze on the girl. 'In more ways than one'.

----------

Raven watched the timer tick down, and awaited the buzzer to tell her to start. She bent her knees, and moved her cloak enough to find that her legs weren't still rippling with energy. 'Good' she thought, relieved to know Robin wouldn't have something new to worry about and harp on. She still had a slight headache, but shrugged it off as she closed her eyes to concentrate. The rest of the world went black as it disappeared and floated away, everything growing silent. She waited, readying herself for the sound she was tuned in to, and waiting for. A few seconds later, the buzzer went off.

Immediately, she jumped from her place on the ground, and shot through the air, down the course. Her cloak rustled in the wind as the air rushed past it, and she felt it tug at her shoulders. A pair of stun turrets made their way into view, as they popped up to reveal their position, and opened fire. Raven dodged the first few bolts of energy, but found that they were coming too fast to dodge all at once. She brought her hand up, forming a shield, and straightened out her flight path as she continued towards the turrets, realizing something didn't quite feel right. Blaming it on her headache and ignoring it for the meantime, she focused on the threat at hand.

Through the black of her barrier and flurry of bolts from the turrets, she spotted a large boulder nearby, but decided against it. Using it to crush the turrets would mean having to stop and concentrate on moving such a large mass, leaving her without a shield, and as a sitting duck for the turrets. She surmised that going with a blast of energy would be quicker and safer to do from her position. As she neared her target, she brought her arm back in a swift motion to throw a ball of energy, but what happened when she followed through was not what she expected at all. Instead of a ball, a steady stream of energy rushed out, fluidly running down her arm, around her hand, instantly destroying her target. It felt as if the energy was flowing right off of her, rather than being summoned up, or called forth as it always had. It was then that she realized what hadn't felt right before. Her barrier felt as if it had been stronger; deflecting the bolts with greater ease than normal, and her flight had been faster as well. It felt weird—but liberating—having all of her power literally at her fingertips, ready to be released on her own free will. Using this much energy usually required large amounts of concentration, yet it felt like child's play since all it took was a flick of the wrist. Something definitely wasn't right, but Raven thanked the strange occurence for now; realizing the lack in effort it allowed to concentrate on her tasks at hand. It certainly would help alleviate the throbbing behind her temples.

----------

Cyborg stood back at the start of the course, watching as Raven banked up and to her left, heading for the moving path rings all the fliers had to dodge their way through, including Beast Boy. He looked up to the control panel and found Robin punching the controls, while the changeling sat back in his seat, not even bothering to watch Raven's run.

"Yo B, she might actually beat ya!" he shouted, causing Beast Boy to open his eyes, and look at him.

"Yes, would it not be most joyful to see both Beast Boy and Raven beat the record for our course of obstacles?" Starfire smiled, looking back and forth between her teammates.

Cy, clearly confused as to what the Tamaranian was trying to say, gave her a funny look

"Uhhhhh… Go Raven?" He remarked perplexedly, trying to make sense of Starfire's comment. The Boy Wonder just hid a small laugh with a smirk, not noticing a new shadow snake its way across the control panel in front of him.

"Well, well, well… If it isn't the Titans…" A voice came from behind Robin, who turned around in his chair. "If you were looking for a fight, why not come looking for me? I would've happily obliged."

The man chuckled.

"Now I just feel unwanted"

"You never were!" Robin glared up at the black figure standing on a rock wall above him. "What do you want?"

"Ahh, I see you're still taking life way too seriously, kid" The Man said, bringing his hand to his chin. "But if you must know, I've grown tired of petty thefts and five finger discounts. I was looking for a… _bigger _challenge."

"Well, you've got one now!" Cy said, readying his sonic blaster.

"It's not what you think really… In fact, I was hoping we could talk it over. However, seeing how things are between us... it seems I'll be extending your training before any serious communication occurs."

The smugness in the man's voice just aggravated Robin even more.

"Just remember, X marks the spot." The Man snorted arrogantly, leaning over and referencing the red mark across his chest.

"You heard him team," Robin addressed those around him. "Titans, GO!"

----------

Raven, on the other hand, was still out on the course, oblivious to what was going on. The sorceress was thankfully coming to the end of her run, and faced three heavy metal doors in her path. As they began to close, she picked up some speed. She flew right under the first door, but the second forced her to the ground as she passed beneath it. As she tumbled to her knees, Raven found herself sliding in the mud toward the third door.

The grey slab of metal before her slowed to a breif halt as the bottom edge glowed black; her magic working its way up the device. Before she even had full control of the door, her momentum continued to carry her, and she managed to slide mere inches beneath the looming weight in a very fluid, yet limbo-like motion. She continued to slide a few feet with her back arched before she came to a stop. Straightening herself out, she was taken by suprise; the area was new to her, and what used to be a straight line from here to the finish was no longer. Now, the place where she had stopped was carved out into a large, stadium-like circle, and Raven noticed movement all around her. Cy had added one last part to the course, and she hadn't been watching the others to realize what was coming until now. More turrets. For a fraction of a second, Ravens eyes went wide in fear and shock, but then closed.

'Focus' she told herself.

Not a second later, the turrets opened fire. In no time, Raven put her hands up and a black dome surrounded her. Standing up, she reassessed the situation. The fire was coming from all directions, and she was going to need a way to attack from within her protective bubble.

----------

After watching the rest of his teammates open fire, and disappear on the other side of the wall, Robin took out his bo-staff and extended it. With a quick sprint, he vaulted himself over the rock wall his opponent had been standing on. The moment he landed, a red x flew at him, causing him to tumble to his left. Cyborg was just a few feet away, trying to pry a red x off of his sonic cannon, which prevented it from firing. Starfire was strafing through the air, and pelted the area with her starbolts, causing the man to give up his offense for the moment and dodge them. Off to his right somewhere, Robin found Beast Boy apparently recovering from a hit. Then, realizing where their opponent was heading, he reached for his belt, pulled out a handful of concussive balls, and started sprinting towards the madman.

----------

The black dome was taking a massive beating. Eight turrets were firing stun bolts like machine guns from all three hundred and sixty degrees around. Yet, Raven stood strong not feeling it drain or tug at her soul one bit. She had to think this over and quick if she was going to beat the green bean's time and get him to shut up.

'I could open up a part of my shield and attack each turret, slowly taking them out one by one' She thought, 'Or, fly over to each, and let them take each other out…' she looked down to her fingers. 'Or perhaps…'

Raven had no idea if it would work or not, but with the change in the way her powers were acting, it was worth a shot. She brought her arm to her chest, and swiped it out behind her. The dome held, but her energy sprang out from her fingertips into razor sharp tendrils of energy. As she swung her hand around, they sliced through her barrier, and extended out to three of the turrets behind her, cutting off their energy supply and causing them to topple from their posts, and splash into the mud. Raven looked back, half surprised it had worked.

"I really gotta figure out what's going on." She muttered, turning her attention to the five remaining turrets.

Now she had an advantage. Focusing her mind on the three turrets behind her, she easily encased them in black energy. Her shield, held up with her left hand, was now a semi-sphere, as she took a step back. Then, with her right arm, she reached back like a quarterback without a ball, and threw her arm forward with three outstretched fingers. The turrets that had fallen behind her quickly followed the order and flew over her head, eventually colliding with three more turrets to her right.

"Six down, two to go."

Quickly, she let her shield down, and shot off to her left. 'I can just imagine the look on Beast Boy's face when…' as she zoomed towards the closest turret, she nearly forgot to dodge its fire, and found herself in a chicken fight with one of the stun bolts. She swerved just in time, and quickly had to construct a barrier in front of her to reach the backside of the turret, avoiding the rest of the barrage. As she did, the other turret's fire quickly made work of its former ally. From her position, Raven floated in place, and pushed her shield forward. As it raced for its target, the black wall slowly bent, deflecting the bolts all the way. The semi-sphere slowly changed from convex to concave mid-flight before surrounding the final turret in its own little bubble. Raven's outstretched hand came to a fist, and the sphere quickly crushed the turret inside.

Raven allowed herself a smile of victory once all eight turrets were down. Then without delay, she made her way to the finish line as quickly as possible. She touched down in a deep crouch; suddenly realizing the mud caked onto her legs, and lifted her head.

"So… how was-" She looked over to the control panel, but found no one there. Suddenly it dawned on her that the sounds of battle were coming from the Tower.

"It would've been nice to let me know!" She growled, using her powers to reach out and stop the timer. It was a full 9 seconds faster than Beast Boy's time. She made way for the Tower, and picked up her communicator to call Robin. It was right around then that the cacophony from inside the tower stopped.

"Robin, what's going on? …Robin?" The screen flickered to life, and she stopped.

"Red X"

Her eyebrows furrowed, granting a dull pain from her headache as she tightened the muscles.

"Hello Raven. Did you have fun playing with your little toys while I wrapped up your friends?" He panned the communicator to show a struggling Robin hanging from a wall by a giant red x.

"I thought you weren't into big-time villainy" Raven said, keeping her cool. "You're just a selfish, petty thief with a tricked out suit."

"Couldn't've said it better myself, Raven. But you see, there's something I've come across, and it seems that what I need _now_ is in this Tower."

Robin quit his struggling for the moment, and began to yell something, but Red X quickly slapped one of his x's to Robin's face to keep his mouth shut.

"And what is that?" Raven now dropped to the ground, still three quarters of the way to the Tower.

"Come join me in your Rec Room. You'll have to beat me to find out." Red X tilted his head in what Raven assumed would be a smirk if his mask didn't hide his face, and cut the link.

'Great' she thought. 'Out to save the world again with a headache and out of control powers.' As she finished the thought, she slowly disappeared through the mud beneath her.

To make sure there was no ambush, Raven decided to teleport just outside the doors to the Rec Room, but found they had already been ripped from their hinges. Inside the room stood Red X, leaning against a wall, Robin hanging next to him, and Beast Boy stuck under a red net which he apparently couldn't escape from. The others were nowhere to be found; probably unconscious among the wreckage trailing to what she assumed was the front door.

"Glad you could make it, sweetheart…" Red X's cool, echoing voice overpowered the struggling noises coming from Robin and Beast Boy. Raven felt her whole body flare up in her black magic at the last word. Even Beast Boy stopped his struggle to correct the man.

"Raven is _nobody's_ sweetheart! Don't you ever talk to her like that-"

"Or what? You'll-" Almost losing track of what Raven was doing, he glanced over in time to catch a 20 pound dumbbell heading for his face, and ducked.

"Or _you'll_ have to pay for it." Her headache was still clouding her mind, but she managed to keep everything together.

"So you wanna fight dirty, eh? I can manage that." It was then that Raven remembered why she hated fighting him so much. He disappeared.

"What do you want?" Her tone had some bite to it as she asked into the open room, while settling into a defensive stance. Her hopes were that he might respond, giving his position away, but those hopes went unanswered.

'Even Beast Boy probably wouldn't have fallen for something so obvious.' She shifted warily while she glared into the air surounding her. Suddenly, Red X appeared behind her, and with a swift kick to her back, sent her to the floor.

"Raven!" Beast Boy yelled. Robin's eyes also showed signs of concern. The changeling went into another fit of shape shifting, trying to escape the net. Red X pressed his knee against the small of Raven's back, holding her arms in place as well.

"Don't… touch… her" the changeling growled between shifts, still unable to break free.

Disregarding the yells, Red X simply began answering Ravens question.

"As you know, I'm selfish. And as I told your friends, I went looking for a challenge, which ultimately became… troublesome." He paused to stare over towards the many grunts and growls coming from Beast Boy's side of the room. Meanwhile, Raven breathed in heavily, trying to catch the wind that had been knocked out of her.

"And that's why," Red X looked to Robin, and squeezed Raven's arms a little harder, "I need _you_".

Robin's eyes widened in shock, but Raven took this as the time to attack, and let her energy flow right up his arms, releasing his grip, and blasted him away. He simply grabbed a chin-up bar, and swung around it before landing on his feet like a cat. She stood, grabbing another weight with her mind, and chucked it at him. The funny thing was, it didn't seem to follow her orders as immediately as hoped, and he simply threw an 'x-star' at the center, splitting the weight in half, and diverting it to his sides.

"Then why are you fighting me?" Raven growled, hiding her confusion and fear of what was going on with her powers. She was struggling to think over the headache as she did her best to keep it at bay.

"Because, it's no use if I can simply defeat you all myself." He jumped up from his position, and two x's fired from his palms. Raven put up her dome, but it shattered when the first x hit it. Out of pure reaction, she put her hand up to block her face from the other, a small trail of black following its path. It, too, shattered, but stopped the x enough that it settled into her palm. She was horrified, and it started to show on her features as she stared at the x in her hand.

"My powers…"

"Seems you drained yourself with your training; such a shame really. I thought someone like you would have more stamina than that." Red X was now feet away from her, and an all out fist fight commenced. At first, Raven was clearly on the defensive, but soon began her own attacks as the two fought on without their powers.

Robin looked on, clearly impressed with how well Raven was holding up against someone who was _almost_ as good at martial arts as himself, but he was also worried. Raven had never completely lost her powers before. They did weaken over time in battle, but never this quickly, and certainly not this much. He took a moment to think about it.

'It has to have something to do with whatever she's dealing with. It has to be.' He mentally cursed himself for not prying further. 'I hope Star can get out of that red mess and help her.'

Robin was optimistic that the Tamaranian could break free; truly believing that the sticky gunk Red X had covered her with wouldn't hold up against her alien strength, or eyebeams for that matter. Still, there was no sign of her. Cyborg was also missing, somewhere downstairs, either shut down, in pieces, or knocked out. Robin didn't really know what had become of him because whatever X did to him, occurred while Robin had taken a different path, attempting to cut the villain off from the rest of the Tower. He looked over at the green boy to his right; Beast Boy had given up trying to break free again, as they both watched the fight go on, totally helpless to save their troubled teammate. What made it worse was that she was slowly losing.

Red X was getting a kick out of how well the dark titan could fend for herself in a hand-to-hand battle. Part of it was that she looked so frail, and part of it was that she was just a girl. She wasn't perfect, but he had thought she'd be totally helpless without her powers. When he finally became bored with the physical assertion their skirmish was demanding, he decided to end it. He swung a kick to her side, which she easily blocked, but then he angled his hand for her feet. The mark adorning his hand glowed red, and an x came out, binding her feet together, throwing her off balance. She threw a punch, but it only worked as momentum to bring her toppling to the floor. Upon impact, and unbenounced to him, her massive headache turned into an agonizing migrane, causing her to grasp her head and scream out in pain.

"Raven! Get up!" Beast Boy's cry was dripping heavily with concern and anger for not being able to help. Red X simply took the time to grab her hands once again, and pin her to a wall.

"Well, that was fun while it lasted" He held his face just inches from her own as she tried to wriggle free. She tried conjuring up her powers, but all she managed were a few ripples that disappeared halfway down her arms. She was about to head butt him, but he stepped back, two new x's holding her wrists against the wall.

"Five for five." He laughed, looking almost disappointed. "People have tried armies, and master plans… but the Titans don't seem so tough to me".

"Wanna bet?" A voice came from behind him, startling all except Raven who had seen the bee fly up behind X. She quickly grew, and performed a roundhouse kick to his face.

"Bumblebee!?" Robin and Beast Boy shouted in disbelieving unison, though Robin's came out as a mere muffled sound. Bee reached down, and grabbed Red X's belt before he could react, ripping it from his waist.

"I heard you guys needed some help taking out the trash." She threw the belt over her shoulder, and glanced over to see the boys' predicament, and smirked. "And it looks like I arrived just in time".

Red X hopped to his feet, but was no match for the superhero without his synthetic 'powers'. She simply diverted to keeping her distance, and stinging him until he gave in to the pain. After tying him up, she began releasing the Titans from their red contraptions. Raven was the first to be released, and took a moment to suppress the commotion pounding in her head.

"So… you're still in town?" Her raspy voice showed no real emotion, but her raised eyebrow said that she was somewhat interested. The two girls went to release Robin and Beast Boy, Raven taking the latter.

"Yeah," Bee said with a little enthusiasm creeping into her voice, "Sparky called, and said you guys had run into a predicament". She brought one of her B-shaped stingers to one of the points of the 'x' holding Robin against the wall, and cut it, allowing him to wriggle free, and jump down.

"Seems like you guys really needed a hand; that, or you were caught sleeping."

Robin lowered his head, frustrated that his team had fallen apart so easily; defeated by _one_ man in a suit _he_ had created. Raven was working on finding a way to get Beast Boy out of the net. She needed to cut it open or use her powers, neither of which she could do at the moment, but she tried anyway. A hand reached over her shoulder, and one of the yellow stingers followed, cutting a hole big enough for Beast Boy to escape from. Raven let out a sigh, and all she could think in her head was 'showoff'.

"Wait wait wait… sooooo you've been in town, and haven't told us? What are you doing here? I mean... it's not that I'm ungrateful you saved our butts or anything, but like…" Beast Boy scratched his head, "I don't get it…"

Bumblebee stood there, listening to the changeling's incoherent rambling, a look of confusion started shadowing over her face.

"You mean… Sparky didn't tell you?" Her confusion quickly turned to anger as the green teen shook his head 'no'. A muffled plea came from Robin, as he tried peeling the 'x' off his mouth. Raven just shook her head. _Very_ carefully.

"What I think she means to say is that her and the tin man need to have a chat." Raven glared over at Beast Boy, and added, "In _private_". It was a known fact he had a knack for being a 'fly on the wall' in a literal sense. She turned her attention back to the Boy Wonder, still struggling with his gag.

Bumblebee turned bright red.

"Oh, he'll be a pile of rusty bolts and scrap before I'm through with him!" She turned on her heel, and stormed out of the room in search for the metal teen. The others didn't protest. Raven walked up to Robin, a smirk lighting up her face.

"Looks like it's time for a little payback." Her smirk grew into a grin when she saw his eyes widen at her remark. "It's only fair, since you did it to me while _you_ were the one behind that mask". She reached up to the 'x' covering his mouth, and he closed his eyes. Quickly, she ripped it off, sending the boy into a cursing fit, as he tried to rub the feeling back to his lips.

"You know, it doesn't seem fair since _I_ wasn't the one who ripped yours off." He whined, but she just gave him a glare. "Fine. Even." He gave in, knowing what was done, was done. "Well, I better go help Star with that mess X left her in" he turned to the man tied up in the corner before he left.

"Don't look at me," He said, sitting on the floor, "If she had better training, she would've been able to dodge it."

Robin turned away, looking gruff as he too, stormed out of the Rec Room. Raven brought a hand to her head, trying to massage her temples, and turned for the door as well.

"I need to get some rest. Think you can handle him Beast Boy?" The changeling could sense the pain in her voice even though she tried to mask it. She was beyond tired. She had a migraine; her powers were acting weird, she had just been beaten up by Red X, and to top it all off, she still had to deal with… whatever it was she supposedly felt about Robin and Beast Boy.

'Today just keeps getting worse, doesn't it' She grumbled in her head, but as she turned to leave, she felt a hand grab at hers, turning her back around to face Beast Boy.

"Raven? You know how you said that if I needed to talk-" He started slowly, but she cut him off with a discontented sigh.

"Beast Boy, I know what I said, but right now is _really_ not a good time-"

"I just want you to know that the same goes for you." He looked down rather sheepishly, "You know… I'll… be there if you need me." Raven didn't pay attention to the concern in his voice. Instead, she felt reality melt away for a second, as a sensation in the pit of her stomach rose to life. It was as if all the voices and confusion in her head had suddenly stopped as well. A few moments later, she found she was staring at him, and everything fell back to what it had been before, despite the addition of some redness drawing its way across her cheeks.

"Awww,.. Isn't that sweet? The beauty falling in love with a beast; no wonder the Titans have gone soft." Red X mused from the corner of the room.

Just then, something snapped in Raven; something that neither her, nor her emotions could prevent. In no time, she crossed the room, stopping in front of the man who sat on the floor, tied up and defenseless. She reached back, and let her punch fly right into the left side of his face. He almost immediately went unconscious, but not before he heard her last words.

"_That, _is for _touching_ me!"

"Duuuude! Raven! What are you doing?!" The changeling rushed over to her, but stopped when she slowly started walking towards the door. "Woah," He saw Red X laying on the floor, completely unconscious. As she passed him, her expression laid somewhere between anger and fear. Beast Boy was really confused now.

'First she loses her powers, then she apparently picked up martial arts on the fly, then Bee showed up from nowhere, and now she just punched the daylights out of a defenseless villain for something so small as touching her?' Slowly, he tried to get words to come to his mouth.

"Heh…. Uhhh… nice hit. But uh, how am I gonna… explain it to Robin?" His voice almost felt withdrawn, fear of her unstable nature making him slow down to choose his words wisely.

"Say he got out of line. I just made sure he knew where it was." She continued for the doorway.

"Hey Rae?" he watched her from behind as she slowed to a stop, her shoulders relaxing.

"What." Her monotonous voice was back, but it didn't hold the anger he had expected. The changeling paused for a moment, thinking about it.

"You fought well back there. I think you had Robin and I both surprised." He let a small laugh out, and she turned to face him. "But Rae,…" his voice turned more serious, "I'm serious… I'll be there anytime you need to talk." He too, noticed she was troubled with something, and her weird behavior was only proving his concern. She was stubborn, but perhaps there was a vague chance she would come to him if he pushed his point.

"Beast B-" she tried to protest, but he cut her off with one final, pressing word.

"_Anytime_"

* * *

**O.o Raven snapped, and our favorite little green goofball is being serious! What now? From the looks of it, Cyborg's gonna be in his own pile of trouble soon, as well! Man... maybe the Titans _are_ growing soft, or at least breaking down. What is to come, especially now that Red X is after the Titans? We shall see! **

**As always, feel free to drop a review, and tell me how it's going. Good, bad, ugly... I care not! Knowing people are actually reading this keeps me going. If something's bugging you, feel free to mention it, as well as any possible guesses you might have at what will come. Who knows, it just might happen, or at the very least, I'll know what's on your minds!**

**You can thank N.o.S. for ridding me of those nasty blocks of text I've been having every so often :) thats probably a treat in and of itself! Hope you enjoyed! **

**Until Next Time, ~VociferousVixenofDarkness**


	5. Trust Me If You May

**Chapter 5: Trust Me If You May**

Robin had gone off to go find Starfire in the hall downstairs. Although saving her was something he loved doing, his demeanor remained stern; his disappointment only visible to someone with a trained eye.

'Maybe we _are_ beginning to fall apart' Robin thought, as he went over what had just happened. 'We should've _known_ to stick together. I should have _realized_ Raven wasn't with us. We should have _helped_ each other out.' Suddenly, he paused in the hallway.

'I should have _never_ created Red X'. For the moment, He let all the guilt from their defeat fall onto his shoulders; but then realized that it was more than just that.

'There are too many secrets...We're growing soft—not because we don't know how to fight--but because we aren't being honest with each other.' He looked up, starting to walk down the hall again as he continued on in his head.

'Raven's hiding something, Cy's apparently secretly hanging out with 'Bee, and… ' He zoned out for a few moments before returning to his thoughts. 'I guess I haven't been completely truthful at times either. Why does it seem like the only ones who _haven't_ separated themselves from the team are Beast Boy and…' he turned a corner in the hallway.

"Star!"

She stopped her struggling to face the Boy Wonder.

"Robin! You are here! I take it we have been victorious over the Red X?" Her face immediately lightened up; it was as if she had forgotten she was still stuck in the red gunk holding her to the floor. Robin walked over to her, his weight shifting a little uneasily.

"Well, I'm not sure about 'we', but _someone_ managed to defeat him." He took out a bird-a-rang and started hacking away at the red material around her feet.

"But if it was not one of us who defeated the Red X, then who…" Her face looked concerned as she realized that Robin was taking it personally that none of their teammates had defeated Red X.

"Robin, are you alright?" Her sullen tone seemed so out of character, but when she was concerned about Robin, she couldn't help but take things seriously. It was typical for him to beat himself up over trivial things that did not matter.

"I'm fine, Starfire." He mumbled as he continued to cut her free, "I'm just concerned that the team is closing itself off: Cyborg's been hanging out with Bee and called her in to help finish off Red X and… Raven's been…"

He didn't want to bring attention to her situation, knowing the more they asked, the more she'd isolate herself, but luckily he didn't have to finish.

"Bumblebee is here?!?" Starfire flew up as Robin cut away the last of the red stuff holding her in place. She would need a new outfit, but at least it wasn't in her hair like the time he had used the stuff on Beast Boy.

"Uh, yeah, but…"

Starfire grabbed his arm and flew down the hall before he could finish.

"I must greet her! Tell me Robin, where is she?" He began to regain his balance in her grasp, and tried to make her let go.

"Star, I don't think now's the right ti-"

They both stopped outside the Common Room doors as they heard yelling and things being tossed around inside.

----------

"I can't believe you!!" Bumblebee shouted angrily, "You were just going to lie this whole time, and pretend we weren't dating?!?"

Bumblebee picked up a conveniently close Gamestation controller, and pitched it at her boyfriend.

"What, are you ashamed of me or something? Or is it because you still have feelings for _Jinx_?!"

The next object to hit the cowering Cyborg was one of the many remotes in the room.

"C'mon Bee, that's not it! You know I don't have feelings for Jinx any-"

"Then what are you waiting out for, a stupid fan girl or _Raven_ or something?" Bumblebee snarled, still fuming, "Because you don't even _deserve_ someone like her, and hell, after this stunt, you don't even _deserve_ me!"

She was now towering over Cyborg, poking the arm he had taken to shielding himself with.

"I come all the way out here—to the other side of the country—to leave my team for a few days and see you, and you think you can just go around pretending like I'm not even _here_!? That's not what a _real _man does!" Bumblebee wailed furiously, "But then again, I guess you wouldn't know, seeing how you're half machine. So let me clear it up for you: A real man is _proud_ of his girl and can't wait to tell everyone—_especially_ his best buds—about her."

"Listen, I can explain…" Cyborg said sheepishly, pushing the snarling girl away while attempting to compose himself for the ensuing explanation.

"Explain!? Oh, this better be good, Sparky!" Bee spat back, crossing her arms and leaning back with a glare at her soon-to-be ex.

"Listen, I _had_ to be quiet about it. If Robin knew-"

She cut him off.

"Don't _even_ try to blame this on someone else!" Bumblebee growled, her glare intensifying, half wondering why she was still here listening and not on her way home.

"Just listen, Bee. I know you're upset, but hear me out." Cyborg began soothingly, hoping to put his girlfriend's mind at ease, "If Robin found out, he'd be all over my case about how heroes don't have _time_ for relationships and how it makes them vulnerable; it gives the enemy weak spots to exploit and all that jazz."

"So? Who _cares_ what he says?!" She retorted, chiding her beau, "You're afraid to be in a relationship because you don't want some arrogant, spiky haired, traffic-light breathing down your neck about it? Grow up!"

Robin decided to put her description of him aside for now as both he and Starfire continued to listen in on their conversation through the metal doors of the Common Room.

"Yeah, but think about it. If he knew it was _you_, then he'd be all over _your_ case as well." Cyborg shouted firmly, "You're the leader of Titan's East. Leaving your team for personal reasons would warrant a whole bunch of 'leaders have to be role models' lectures in and of itself. Who knows what else he'd find to chew you out about. In fact, he'd probably ask _both_ of us to leave so we wouldn't 'weaken' the Titans with some 'silly relationship!' Did you really want all of that?"

Robin couldn't see the air quotes, but he could tell what he had done to Cyborg's mentality as far as dating was concerned. Bee relaxed her stance some, as most of the points her boyfriend made were valid, but she still wasn't completely satisfied with how he was leaving the situation.

"I guess not. But even if that _was_ all true, you could have at least done _something_ about my appearance here..." Bee continued, still unnerved, "Like mention that I'm working on a lead, or seeing a friend. You know? Let them know that I'm here rather than keeping the whole thing a big ol' secret."

"That's not a bad idea 'Bee, but you _know_ I don't like lying to my teammates." Cyborg said forcefully, rationalizing his actions, "I treat them the way I want to be treated..."

He trailed off.

"Sometimes leaving things out is easier than telling a lie..."

Robin took this time to barge into the room, leaving Starfire holding her ear to where the door had been.

"Leaving things out _is_ easier than telling a lie, but that doesn't make either of them right." Robin barked as he marched down the steps with a hint of anger in his eyes. This is _exactly_ what needed to be dealt with…Now.

Bumblebee whirled around to face him, an irritated look plastered across her face.

"Don't I remember you _being_ there when Raven said we needed to chat in _private?_"

She was now in his face. He bent back backwards, gulping at the sight of the distraught woman in front of him.

"It's kinda… not really private if we can hear you in the hallway…" Robin replied rather sheepishly.

"Friends!" Starfire interjected before Bee was about to strike, "Do not fight! Robin is correct in evaluating the lack of privacy. You are much too loud and occupy the largest room of the Tower. If you had wished to be subtle, then I suggest the roof or perhaps a smaller room."

Cyborg, who was now feeling safer with all eyes off him, couldn't help himself.

"Really, Star? Are you speaking from experience with Robin?"

His playful tone and wink had Starfire up in a blush in no time. Unfortunately, all eyes turned back to him. Bumblebee looked slightly curious, but Robin looked like he was about to tear him a new one.

* * *

Beast Boy watched as the dark blue cloak concealing a broken girl gracefully left the Rec Room. He couldn't help but stare even after she was gone, trying to think of what was going on with her. He looked over to see Red X still slumped on the floor, unconscious. He walked over to him and picked him up in the least awkward way possible before heading for the door. As he carried the man down the hall, he tried to put an explanation to Raven's odd behavior.

'Maybe she just feels insecure without her powers' Beast Boy thought, trying to guess at what caused her outburst. It was possible, but even to him, it didn't seem like something she would work herself up over.

'It's just not like her to snap like that. Unless…' He quickly shook his head, trying to shut the imagery out of his head.

'We defeated Trigon. We took him down…' The changeling thought worriedly, 'There's no reason he'd be trying to control her again.'

The remembrance of all that the team went through sent shivers down his spine. For a moment, he remembered how it had felt to think Raven was gone forever; those final moments before she disappeared, filtered through the black of her magic. It was the same feeling that had taken him over when he had to leave Terra in her cave, only stronger.

"Heh…" Beast Boy began, trying to cheer himself up, "It's like I'm a bad luck charm for the ladies. I wonder when it's Star's turn to go missing."

But his attempt at a joke backfired, and it did little to settle his mind. His thoughts went blank for a moment before they turned back to Raven's odd behavior.

'She _has_ been oddly tolerant of me lately... Maybe not completely _accepting_, but fairly tolerant compared to her usual behavior.'

He reached the stairs and carefully began his way down toward the floor that held the interrogation room. He let out a small laugh.

"And to think… last night she thought _I_ was the one having problems."

* * *

Raven made her way down the hall toward the stairs. Without her powers, walking was going to be the only way to get to her room. Not that it really mattered; she wouldn't have had the strength to fly or teleport even if she _did_ have them. Her head still ached and her mind was being pulled in all sorts of directions. What had just happened? Why did she snap? Why were her powers gone? Why didn't Red X just tie her up in the first place? Why couldn't she stop this massive headache? Why did she have to be so tired? Why couldn't the team handle Red X? Why… why did Beast Boy care? Some of the answers she knew, but that was beside the point; each question felt like it had two opposing answers and those that didn't were nebulous and open to interpretation. One thing was certain though, as she began climbing the stairs: Despite how overactive her emotions seemed, she was exhausted both physically _and_ mentally. She stopped at the top of the stairs to catch her breath and soothe a few of her fresh bruises, only to hear the door open a few floors below. She stiffened when she heard a faint laugh echo in the stairwell.

"And to think… last night she thought _I_ was the one having problems."

It was Beast Boy. _Laughing_ at _her_. But why? He had been so mature and concerned about her not five minutes ago. She wasn't sure whether to cry because he had only been pretending to care, be mad at him for making a joke out of her condition, or to laugh; seeing how _he_ was the reason she was having problems in the first place. She groaned in her head.

'Yet another situation with multiple, opposing reactions.'

Standing at an impasse, she watched over the railing to see his shadow descend a few levels, and waited for the door to slam shut. When it finally did, she let out a sigh.

"Great. Now I'm even losing my mind over what BB-eeeast Boy says."

She caught the slipup a little late and cursed herself for using his nickname. She needed to clear her mind. For a moment, she debated whether or not to go to the roof and meditate, but ultimately decided against the extra effort; all she felt like doing now was getting some much-needed rest. Emotions, healing, and a fresh breeze would just have to wait. As she opened the door and walked down the hall, Beast Boy's words continued to reverberate in her mind.

'It's not that I want to hate him, it's just… sometimes he doesn't know what _not _to say.'

She reached her door, and looked down before opening it, eyeing what was left of the now dried, caked-on mud from her training run.

She let out a sigh.

"I guess sleep isn't in _immediate_ order…" Raven ground out in a low and gravelly voice, clearly annoyed.

As Raven entered her room, she unlatched her cloak and went to hang it on the corner of one of her bookshelves. Next to her was a large mirror that covered the wall behind her desk. Something in it caught her eye, and she stole a glance, realizing just how different she looked: Her hair was a small mess of its own; her eyes drooped with sleepiness and pain, and there were tiny droplets of mud strewn across her body that acompanied the large splotches smeared across her legs.

She shook her head in disgust and headed for the bathroom to draw a warm bath. Once the tub was full, she turned off the tap and slipped into the water, taking a few moments to adjust herself so she wasn't resting on anything sore. Though she had many thoughts flooding her mind, one stood out in particular; whether or not she should take Beast Boy up on his offer. After a while, the heat started to sink in, and she relaxed a little, slowly drifting to sleep. Though a decision was never reached, the question continued to reassert itself.

The warm blanket of bathwater slowly took her prisoner, and once she was fully tucked away in her dream world, her emotions began taking over.

Each took turns—one by one—playing out their version of what would happen as a result of taking the offer. Some showed her good scenarios while others played out the bad; some just tortured her with a glimpse at what their impending temper tantrums would be like over this silly situation. All in all, she wasn't getting any of the rest she had hoped for.

* * *

Beast Boy felt unsettled as he entered the interrogation room and sat Red X in a corner; still bound and unconscious. He stood there, and looked over Red X's body, replaying the fight that had just occurred. A wave of guilt washed over the green teen, and his ears drooped little by little.

'I should've been there…she needed help. Why did I have to go and get caught so easily?'

A familiar feeling slowly rose from the pit of his stomach, and his guilt began shifting to anger. He realized what that feeling was…

It was the same one that always sat hiding in the back of his mind when he saw Raven.

It was the one that nagged him to keep up his antics around her.

It was… the one feeling he tried so hard to purge from his memory the day it had been maliciously crushed by Terra. _It_ was love.

"Gah! How could you be so stupid?!" Beast Boy snapped, slamming his fists on the metal table in the middle of the room. "It's no _wonder_ she thought something was wrong with you! All this time, and you were too stupid to notice. Jeez Garfield, grow a brain!"

His outbursts left Red X stirring in the corner. The masked villain cringed as he became painfully aware of his throbbing jawbone.

"Unghh… your girlfriend packs a punch" The masked villain mumbled almost incoherently. Settling for rubbing out the soreness with his shoulder, he struggled with his bindings to straighten himself, shifting to an upright position.

"Don't tell me Garfield's some sort of pet name she gave you…"

Beast Boy froze. For a moment, he held steady; his back facing the villain. Eventually, his emotions got a hold of him.

"She's _not_ my girlfriend!!" Beast Boy wailed, irritated by the thief's impertinence, and with a swift punch, Red X slumped to the floor for the second time that day.

After a few seconds of reeling himself back in, Beast Boy decided to append his last statement with a low growl.

"Not _yet._"

* * *

"Whoa whoa whoa… Let me get this straight. So Mr. Boy Blunder over here gets to have his _own_ little romances on the side of crime fighting, yet he expects _us_ to all follow his _'lead'_, and be single? Talk about a hypocrite."

Bee didn't notice the steam billowing from Robin's ears until she peeled her eyes from Cyborg to face him.

"That's how _I_ take it anyway." She placed a hand on her hip. "You two are secretly _boyfriend_ and _girlfriend_, despite your own rules against dating as a Titan…"

Bee pointed to Robin and then Starfire as she summarized what seemed clear as day to her. Robin just hung there for a minute, letting his anger steep back down to a reasonable level. The gears in his head were grinding away at trying to formulate a response without putting himself on the wrong end of anything—or rather—anyone.

'Don't blow it.' He exhorted himself, 'Remember the _last _time you said Star wasn't your girlfriend. It almost got the two of you killed.'

"Uhhh…" Robin raised a finger to protest, but Starfire came to his much-needed rescue.

"Robin has made _no_ such rules! The rule of which you speak is merely your own perception of what Robin thinks you should do. Though clearly, despite your fears regarding it, it has not stopped you."

Robin looked up at Starfire; her once happy, blushing face had turned to one of scorn. She was obviously taking offence that someone was trying to put him down, but he had to admit Bumblebee was partially right.

'It's kind of an unwritten rule' Robin reminded himself.

He didn't dare say it aloud, and for good reason; both Bumblebee and Cyborg were right in their suspicions. There was no doubt he'd disagree and possibly lecture them, but they were also right on another point: Even though it wasn't official, and despite the fact he'd never admit it, he _had _been breaking his own rules—written or not. Though for now, he was just glad to be out of the woods. He would have to find another time to gather the team up and set things straight, once they had all cooled down.

Cyborg could feel the tension building between the girls who had taken to glaring daggers at each other. Despite his interest in seeing a catfight break out, he tried to diffuse the situation before all hell broke loose.

"Who wants pizza?"

The question seemed to catch everyone off guard, but rather than answering, they all looked at him as if he had two heads; wondering what _pizza_ had to do with any of this. Just then, the doors to the Common Room hissed open, revealing the resident changeling who seemed visibly plagued by some sort of inner turmoil.

"Your evil twin is in the interrogation room, Robin"

The typical joy and happiness in Beast Boy's voice was gone, and the statement came out apathetically. He walked over to the couch and plopped down with his face in his hands, completely ignoring the others.

"Uhhh… okay…"

Robin didn't feel like questioning the boy; it seemed like it had become mandatory for everyone to act strangely today. Instead, he brought his attention to the duty at hand.

"I guess it's time for a chat with our friend." Robin said as he separated himself from the group and made his way to the door.

"Uh…He may not be conscious right now…" Beast Boy called out as Robin reached the doorway.

"What? Why not?" Robin responded, confusion inundating his tone and countenance.

Bumblebee, Cyborg, and Starfire all cast puzzled glances at the changeling, who sat on the couch dejectedly.

"He kinda…got outta line." Beast Boy said, using the line Raven had given him. He sat silently, and a few seconds passed while he debated whether or not she really needed to be included in this mess.

"So?"

"So… I might have… you know, put him in his place…" Beast Boy replied, letting out a nervous laugh, not knowing how Robin would react.

'It's not a _total_ lie…' He tried to reassure himself, 'I _did_ hit him... Besides, the last thing Raven needs is Robin jumping down her throat.'

Surprisingly, their leader just let out a sigh before turning and heading through the door. He knew Beast Boy was holding something back, and it just added to the whitewash surrounding each member of the team.

'All of these secrets need to stop, and stop soon.' Robin growled in his head. He was going to have to address it while everyone was around. 'Perhaps dinner will be the best time to tell them.'

---

Back in the Common Room, the other three Titans stared at Beast Boy on the couch. Something obviously had a hold of his mind.

"Hey B, what's goin' on ma-" Cyborg was the first to speak up.

The changeling looked up at his friend's face as the door hissed open again.

"Oh and Cy, if you're getting pizza, make sure there's pepperoni for me!" Robin shouted, popping his head into the room before retreating back down the hallway.

Like a switch, Beast Boy's mood lit up instantaneously.

"You guys are getting pizza?"

Cyborg decided to disregard Beast Boy's odd behavior and play along.

"Umm, yeah. What does everybody want?"

Starfire on the other hand, didn't give it up as easily.

"Beast Boy, do you feel alright?" Starfire asked, concern evident in her tone. She watched as he shrugged it off and hopped up from the couch.

"I'm fine, Star. Make sure there's a Veggie Supreme for me!"

Bumblebee thought about it for a second.

"That actually doesn't sound half bad…" Bumblebee said, agreeing with Beast Boy. However, upon seeing the sinking look washing across her boyfriend's face, she changed her mind, hoping to appease the mirthless man.

"But then again… I _could_ go for some Barbeque Chicken" She said, shooting Cyborg a gentle smile.

"Aw man, I almost respected you for a second there!" Beast Boy whined as a victorious smirk crossed the lips of his metal friend.

"That's my girl!" Cyborg boasted, proudly placing his large hand on her shoulder. "What about you, Star?"

The Tamaranian's dazed and worried look disappeared as she snapped back to reality from thinking about Beast Boy's odd behavior.

"I shall have a pizza containing green peppers, the apples from a pine tree, the mushrooms from the 'Port of Bella', and the wonderfully mysterious topping known as anchovies!"

Bumblebee cringed along with the others, and opened her mouth to ask why, but Cyborg stopped her.

"You get used to it."

Cyborg looked around; suddenly realizing that Raven had been missing fom their group.

"Hey, where's Raven?"

Upon hearing this, Beast Boy's averted his eyes as he stared off into the distance.

"Oh." Beast Boy muttered, his tone again lacking its usual pep, "She went off to her room to rest. Just get her what she usually gets."

"And that is…" Cy raised an eyebrow. He never really paid attention to what she got, and the orders usually changed so much, he didn't bother keeping track of who got what. This however, left Beast Boy slightly surprised that he was the only one who knew what she typically ordered.

"Umm…" The changeling began, counting it off on his fingers. "Mushrooms, peppers, black olives, pepperoni, and extra cheese."

After rambling it off, he received a few queer looks from his teammates.

"What? Is it a _crime_ to pay _attention_?"

Bumblebee lifted an eyebrow at the boy's offensiveness over the issue, and Cy scratched his head.

"Uhhh… right then. I'll call it in."

* * *

Robin made it down the stairs and into the hallway towards the interrogation room.

'Yes.' He agreed with himself, 'Dinner will be the best time to have everyone settled and listening. I'll just simply say that… um… '

He was drawing a blank.

"Secrets are bad?" Robin whispered to himself almost inaudibly, wanting to hear it aloud.

'No… too vague, and too short. How about…'

"Listen everyone, we need to address our secrets so we don't fall apart as a team."

He shook his head.

'Wow Robin, _that's_ certainly uplifting. Let's see…'

"Whatever you're hiding needs to come to the table _now_, so it's on everyone's plate." Robin said with authority, pounding his fist against his hand for emphasis.

'Nah, a little too corny to say at dinner… not to mention a bit direct. Umm…' Robin rolled his eyes as he continued to mull the subject over in his mind.

"The reason we lost was because we aren't communicating as a team?"

He sighed in defeat as he reached the door; this wasn't going anywhere.

'Too bad this concerns Raven; _she'd_ know how to put this if she wasn't opposed to giving up her own secret.' Robin thought, his frustration building. Clearly, this wasn't going to be as easy as he originally believed.

Robin opened the door and entered the small room, noticing the lump of black in the corner. Fluorescent lights illuminated the room from above, and at the table were two matching metal chairs. He could make out two shallow dents in the table he didn't remember being there before, and only hoped they hadn't been made by Red X's head. It could get ugly trying to explain to the police how the villain wound up with a concussion while he was _tied up_.

He scooted one of the chairs back and it filled the room with a loud, cantankerous squeal as he dragged it across the floor. As he did so, he also managed to catch the villain's eyes tightening against the horrid sound.

"Alright, you've got some explaining to do" Robin ordered, picking the man up by the collar of his suit and sitting him down in the chair.

"Do you always rough up your prisoners?" Red X asked through a moan of pain. He tried shaking it away, but the dull ache wasn't leaving anytime soon. "I'm beginning to think you're no better than Slade."

Robin bit his tongue as he sat down across from the man, fervently trying to restrain his rage at the comment. His eyes narrowed to miniscule slits, and he growled out his retort.

"I heard you got out of line."

Red X struggled in his seat, trying to find a way to rub the pain in his face away.

"Think you could untie my hands and fetch a bag of ice? I think your _boy_ left a nasty mark."

"Not until you start answering a few _questions_." Robin sneered, his voice echoing as it bounced around in the small room. "For instance, what you're _doing_ here, and _why_ you need Raven."

Robin punctuated his statement with a fist on the table before him. The man let his shoulders drop as he let out a sigh.

"I thought it was obvious, kid. Like I've told you; I'm here because I _need_ you. As in _all_ of you."

Robin's face remained hardened, but behind the façade, his mind was spinning.

'What was this? Some sort of joke? A short while ago, he had every one of them tied up and defeated. Was this some sort of complex plan devised by Slade?'

Robin decided to answer offensively, rather than look desperate asking so many questions.

"Well you sure know how to warm us up in a friendly manner."

Red X let out a scoff.

"Don't be so serious." he retorted, practically snickering, "We both know you and I would never sit down for a _civilized_ chat in any other circumstances. Besides, if I can take you all down on my own, there's really no reason to go seeking your help in the first place."

Robin sat back in his chair, a little surprised at the way this was turning out.

"What do you mean?"

"What I _mean_ is, the so called _'trouble'_ I've run into is the fact that I'm being hunted down." Red X said narrowing his eyes, and looking to see just how hard it would be to convince Robin that he wasn't looking to harm the Titans. "In fact…"

"So you came to us, looking for… _protection_?"

Robin's tough guy appeal instantly wore off. Perhaps it would be easier than he thought.

"You could call it that." Red X said matter-of-factly, "Although I have _no_ objection to sitting here and letting you fight _my_ battles…"

He leaned across the table.

"I was _hoping_ we could work… _together._"

* * *

**Hmm... Decisions, decisions, Robin. What will you do? There was alot of Cy/Bee in this chapter, both of which I hope I captured well enough. As for Raven... she's just taking a break for now, trying to straighten herself out. But boy oh boy is Beast Boy acting strange. He finally found out he loves Raven, so why isn't he happy? And what's with the "Not yet?" We shall see!**

**Seeing how this chapter focused on alot of characters in all different places at different times, I hope it didn't get too confusing jumping back and forth. I also hope that since it focused basically on all the characters I'm not used to writing with, that their actions and thoughts meshed well with their character. Again, I want to thank _Novus Ordo Seclorum_ for Beta-ing this and helping me out! Now to go write the next chapter... ;)**

**Please review, and let me know what you think!**

**~VVoD**


	6. Conclaves of Conflicting Conspirators

_So yeah, it's been a while. I'm still here! I had a few computer troubles (I lost all my files for a day) that a wonderful IT guy was able to find and fix. Homework got backed up (everything we do is on a computer), and well... this chapter is almost twice as long as the first few. There. Explained. So that's whats happening in my life, what's happening in yours? (Besides not owning the Teen Titans?) xD_

**On with the story!**

* * *

**Chapter 6: Conclaves of Conflicting Conspirators**

There was a bunch of noise emanating from the Common Room of Titans Tower when Starfire left, as Beast Boy was arguing over—of all things—the buffalo wings Bumblebee had told Cyborg to order. Her uniform was still covered in traces of red gunk, and she decided to take the time to go change into another one. As she floated down the hallway towards her room, she couldn't help but feel a little mad at their surprise visitor.

'How dare she accuse Robin of being so cold-hearted! He would never make up such silly rules for the Titans; especially not allowing relationships.' She gave out a huff, and entered her room. She undid her armor, and gathered the ruined clothes up in a crumpled ball before walking to the trash can to throw them away. When she let go, the ball stuck to her hand, and it took a few rough shakes to get them to finally release and drop into the pink can. Shivering in disgust, she looked upon the pile sitting in the trash.

"What a most unpleasant substance." She said, hoping to never encounter such a repulsive thing again.

She headed across the room to fetch a new outfit from her closet. As she opened the door, the rows of identical uniforms lining the racks brought back memories of the time Robin had left for training, and how the whole team ended up goofing around in his spare uniforms. She smiled.

"He seemed so happy to see us miss him so much. Everyone was afraid he would be most disappointed with our behavior." She let out softly. A memory played out in her head, and she remembered the humor of it all when a newbie crook had interrupted Robin's arrival, and they all showed up as the Boy Wonder to stop him. The crook practically gave up laughing, saying something about how most of them looked better in the suit than Robin.

'How could he possibly scold Bumblebee about leaving Titans East if he left us for his quest for training?' She thought perplexedly, 'Cyborg is clearly making excuses up in his head. Robin would never be _that_ cruel, could he?'

She fell backwards onto her round bed in the center of the room, holding an immaculate new outfit to her chest. It wasn't like she needed to be anywhere, so she decided to cool down and think it over until the pizza came. By then, perhaps she could welcome Bumblebee a little more lightheartedly.

* * *

"So what do we do now?" Bee asked once the pizza had been ordered. "Sit around and wait?"

Beast Boy waved his arms around in the air.

"Helllooooooo… I _told_ you some villain would come around today, and distract us from finishing our game!" He looked to Cyborg and presented his hands in the direction of the Gamestation, sitting on the table in all its glory.

"And what game is that?" Bumblebee questioned, a look of interest on her face.

"Super Mega Monkey Mania 7! Our buddy Cy here was like the only one who could get it here on the west coast!"

"Is that right..?" She gave a wry look over at Cyborg, who nervously scratched the back of his head. "If I remember correctly,_ I_ gave Sparky a copy of that exact game yesterday…"

"Wait… so _you're_ the one who got the game?" Beast Boy asked befuddled, "Why would Cy say he got it from a _store_? Better yet, why would you want to _give up_ such an awesome game?" the changeling's eyes darted between the two, desperately pleading for answers.

"Probably because Sparky over here was too afraid you'd go asking questions." She elbowed her boyfriend in the side.

"Uhh… the reason I didn't say anything was because… well… we were on a date." Cy decided to come clean. "It was my two month anniversary gift."

"You WHAAT?! You… you mean- you two are dating? As in like… together? For two _months_?" Beast Boy was shocked beyond words, and Cyborg decided to rub it in.

"What's the matter grass stain? Mad I beat ya to it?" A wide grin spread across his face, and Bee turned to face him.

"What's that supposed to mean?" She asked, wondering if the two had been secretly fighting over her.

"Our little green bean here has been looking for a date for some time. He just hasn't had any good luck with… the _ladies_." As he lowered his voice for the last word, Cy reached over and tickled 'Bee's sides, causing her to go into a laughing fit.

"Dude! That's not fair! I _so_ totally could've had a ton of hot babes!" Beast Boy retorted. "…I just… didn't want them."

He reflected. '…I wanted one more.'

"Hahaha s-s-stop it haha Sp- ah- ahr- arky." Cyborg lifted Bee up, and carried her to the couch. When he finally sat her down, she playfully slapped his hands away.

"Yeah, sure. If that's the case, then you better give up now. We all know what you _really _want is impossible." He reached for the remote, and turned on the TV. Bumblebee gave him a look, as did the green boy.

"What do you mean?" Beast Boy said in an offensive, flat tone. 'He couldn't possibly know, could he?'

"C'mon dude. Raven will _never_ fall for you. You might as well get over it. I know you both as really good friends; like brother and sister. Believe me. It just won't happen."

"Wha-… h-how…" Beast Boy stumbled, shocked that Cyborg had somehow figured it out.

"It's not that hard to see. And I'm sure as hell Raven could probably see it as well. Wouldn't you think she'd _say_ something after all this time if she knew you liked her?" Beast Boy hung his head in defeat. Cy was right. If _he_ could see it, Raven most certainly would. He had no chance. His fears after his epiphany in the interrogation room were coming to fruition. She _wouldn't_ like him back. He'd just have to settle for some crazy fan girl roaming the streets of Jump City.

Cyborg frowned as he saw his friend's head droop and his expression quickly fade, bereft of any joy. He didn't want to say it, but Beast Boy needed to hear it from a friend before he went on any further and got hurt even more. He looked over at Bumblebee, who also looked a little hurt seeing the boy so down in the dumps.

"C'mon BB, lets finish up our game. I'm sure _Bee_ here could kick your _butt_…" He tried to cheer the boy up by egging him on. The coaxing usually would have been more than enough to interest the boy, but now he just received a cold look from his friend.

"I'm not interested." Beast Boy turned for the door. "Let me know when the pizza comes…" He dragged his feet across the room, his head hung in mourning.

"I'll be on the roof." With that, the doors hissed shut behind him.

"Well that went well." Cyborg sighed out as he turned back to Bumblebee.

"Well you just broke the kid's heart… what do you expect?" She let out with some anger in her tone.

"Believe me. I know Rae like a little sister. She'd never let it happen; and the sooner he finds out, the better." He sighed a little, and shrugged.

"It's just not meant to be."

* * *

Raven awoke with a start. The sudden movement of her sitting upright in the bathtub forced the water to spill out over the edges, and splash onto the floor. She breathed in heavily, catching her breath as she found reality to be calm and peaceful; far from the horrid imagery Rage had forced her to watch in her dreams. Holding her head, she tried to relax, and began chanting her mantra.

"Azarath Metrion Zinthos."

She slowly leaned back, closing her eyes, and used her toes to open the drain.

"Azarath Metrion Zinthos..."

'Get it together Raven. You can't lose your mind just yet.' The water began to recede around her, her buoyancy fading away as she began to use her muscles to hold herself in place.

"Azarath... Metrion... Zinthos..."

'Just think of it as negative energy, draining away from your body.' She coaxed in her mind. 'When it's gone, you'll feel refreshed.'

"Azarath.... Metrion.... Zin-thos...." Her words had slowed down considerably by now, and they dragged on as they followed the flow of her natural breathing cycle.

Sure enough, as the warm water exposed her skin to the cooler air in the room, she couldn't help but feel refreshed and somewhat relaxed. Once the tub had finally drained, she stopped her chant and opened her eyes, extending her arm towards the towel on the sink. It was enveloped in black before slowly drifting to her hand, and for a moment, she had completely forgotten she had lost her power.

"This isn't right." She muttered confusedly as she stared at the towel in her hand, suddenly realizing what had happened. She stood up, and dried herself off, careful not to press too hard on her bruises. "And there's only one way to find out why."

She quickly entered her room and dressed herself before starting a search for her mirror. Finding it on a shelf belonging to various vials of spell ingredients, she took it down and let its weight rest in her hand. She closed her eyes, took in a deep breath, and composed herself for the upcoming confrontation before she brought the object to her face, and gazed into the mirror.

----------

This time, when she landed on the desolate rock, there was no Happy to greet her. Slightly surprised and grateful the typically boisterous greeting had been avoided, she carefully walked over to the archway nearby, and passed through it. As before, she was taken aback, but this time it wasn't because all of her emotions had been waiting; it was the mess that had been left in the wake of what she could only assume to be _many_ battles between them.

There were however, a few emotions scattered about the Common Room of her mind, and luckily, they were minding their own business for now. Or at least resting; she couldn't tell. Two colors—grey and brown in particular—caught her eye, and she walked up to them. Sadness was hovering over her friend Timid, who had taken to curling up into a ball, shaking beneath her cloak.

"What's going on?" Raven tried to ask in her softest voice possible. Despite the rather soothing sound, Timid immediately jumped, and tried burying herself even deeper in her cloak, still shaking like a leaf.

"She- she's not feeling well." The brown cloaked emotion answered, showing a worried and tear-laden face as she turned to Raven. "I don't know what to do. Whatever it is seems to be eating her from the inside out. It's scaring her more and more, and that's before she even deals with the others fighting." Raven looked down at the huddled figure, and tried to deduce what could possibly be wrong.

Sadness continued to explain.

"She's starting to scare _me_. All I've been able to get from her is 'it hurts,' Raven. How can she hurt when nothing is touching her? Wh- whats going on?"

Raven kept watching the shivering cloak before her, searching for answers. When she realized what it probably was, she felt a sudden pang of guilt and worry clench her heart. At the same moment—as if on cue—a faint yelp was heard from within the grey cloak, and the shaking got worse.

"I- I'm- I'm worrying too much." Raven blurted out. It was _her_ fault Timid was going through the pain; she was focusing on the emotion too much, and if she didn't quit soon, the emotion would split.

"And it's all because we pressured you with a relationship…" Sadness deduced, and hung her head, letting a few tears run down her cheeks. Raven just stood there, in complete dismay; unable to bring words to her mouth.

"So what's the Gloom Patrol up to?" Rude barged in on the little huddle the three had made.

"Leave it alone." Raven warned, as she used her right arm to back the emotion away from the others.

"Aww c'mon… I can't have you hangin' around with all the Robin lovers, now can I? Hey Love!" She called out over her shoulder, "Come and teach this girl a lesson about how she _really_ feels!" Raven scowled, and looked behind her to see Love shaking her head from across the room.

Just then, a hand rested on her shoulder, and the figure it belonged to leaned over to watch the gray blob of fabric below them shaking.

"You should go talk to Beast Boy… as a friend. It would put this worry to a temporary standstill while you sort out how you feel." Friendship explained in a calm and welcoming voice. "Or at the very least Cyborg… You need someone to talk to if you want to get rid of this stress."

"Oh… so _now_ you decide to change your mind." Rude rolled her eyes at the emotion draped in lilac.

"No… I simply-"

"It's simply what needs to be done, Rude. It's what's best; regarding affections or not."

"It is?" Raven looked behind her to see a streak of yellow come in between her and rude. Knowledge nodded.

"It is. And it would probably be better if we didn't all crowd around _her_ too." She motioned to the ball of grey they were standing around.

All but Sadness backed away, and they walked to the other side of the room in silence.

"You came here for answers." Knowledge cut through the awkward quiet that had come over them and filled the room.

"She came for a second opinion" Rude corrected as Love joined up with the group.

"She is hardly in the emotional state to deal with affection Rude." Came the caring voice of the violet emotion. For some reason, she reminded Raven a great deal about her mother. "Pushing won't win her over in our direction. It will only push her away."

Rude made a face and stuck her tongue out.

"At least I was _trying_."

Raven sighed. "Rude, can't you go… somewhere else?"

Rude huffed, and gave Raven a disapproving look before backing out of the group.

"_Fine_. See if _I_ care! Just don't all of you come running to _me_ when BB gets thrown to the sidelines." With that, the orange emotion disappeared as she teleported elsewhere in Raven's mind.

"So as I was saying…" Knowledge cleared her throat. "You came here to talk. What's on your mind?"

Raven looked around at the emotions in the room, and then at the damaged room itself. When she brought her eyes back to the thick spectacles adorning Knowledge's face, she glared.

"You." She growled. "_All_ of you. _You're_ the reason I'm having these headaches." Raven saw Love back away, but Knowledge just stood her ground.

"You are correct in concluding that our fights are what is causing the pain in your head, but that is no question. In fact, it should be common sense. What is it you want to _know_?"

"I want you to stop your fighting, so I can think straight!" Raven yelled, her anger growing.

"Raven, you know as well as I, that as long as they desire separate outcomes, they will fight. The only way to stop it is to show one side that their aspirations cannot come true. In effect… you must choose someone."

Raven hated the idea, and was downright furious that Knowledge couldn't think of any possible way otherwise to stop the commotion once she left Nevermore. This left her quietly fuming in front of the yellow cloak, until she felt a tap on her shoulder.

"But maybe if you could… sway some of us to one side or the other; perhaps the disproportion of sides will stop the fighting." Friendship suggested cautiously.

"And how exactly would I do that?" Raven asked, as she turned her attention to the fairly new emotion.

"Talk with them. Interact with them. Find pros and cons about each that will sway us towards whoever you think you might go for." The lilac emotion explained.

"And what if I happen to not like either of them?" Raven asked. Her temper was getting short, but the mere fact that there was perhaps another option kept her cooled down.

Friendship shrugged.

"Fool us and _pretend_ you like someone?"

"If she fools _us_, she is only fooling _herself_." Knowledge interjected. She realized it was a good effort, but the emotion still had a lot to learn.

Love took this time to rejoin the group, finding Raven's temper to be mostly controlled.

"Then you'll just have to find all the reasons to show us why we shouldn't love them." The emotion bowed her head, saddened by the fact that Raven didn't want her in the slightest bit. She couldn't help but think Friendship would eventually take her place, and she'd be tossed aside again as she had been in the past.

Raven noticed the downtrodden Love, and couldn't help but feel sorry for her. It wasn't that she necessarily didn't want her; in fact, she had been working at trying to give the emotion a little more limelight as she matured. The only problem was that she was still afraid of what would happen if she allowed herself to feel that way about someone. The emotion ran deep, and was no doubt powerful. Keeping it in check just wasn't something she thought she could handle yet. Especially after the last time…

"I'll keep it in mind." She rested a reassuring hand on Love's shoulder, and attempted a weak smile.

"But I still want to know what's going on with my powers." She turned to the yellow-clad emotion.

"What about them?" Knowledge replied.

"You know very well what about them." Raven retorted, anger creeping into her voice again. "They're sporadic, I don't have to summon them up, and they flow freely off my…"

"To the contrary Raven. You_ have_ summoned them up. Your own inner turmoil, along with ours, has a great capacity for summoning forth your powers with ease, and without your knowledge. The power is left lying on the surface, awaiting your whim. Therefore, your typical concentration is quite unnecessary to carry out most needs. Consider it… a built-in fight-or-flight response."

Love sighed.

"Father never could be too careful…" Raven decided to let the mention of her father slide.

"So why is it you never _told_ me this?" She glared back at her spectacled emotion.

"Because. It is better that you learn these lessons on your own."

"You _do_ know that you put both _my_ life, _and_ the lives of the others at stake today by _not_ telling me this, don't you?!" Raven loomed over Knowledge, and poked her in the chest, granting a slight look of fear behind those glasses before the emotion backed away to explain.

"A miscalculation was made. You were not troubled until you left here last, and the fact that there was no way to contact you before Red X showed up, _did_ put you in danger. We are both at fault; I, for not warning you ahead of time, and you for not seeking my aid when you noticed a shift in the properties of your power."

Just then, Brave emerged from her archway, and headed toward the group,

"What's all this mumbo jumbo about feeling sorry and being in danger?" She mocked, "Are you still crying over your little encounter with BB?"

Friendship decided to stop the girl, and drag her away from Raven.

"She doesn't need any of your jabs right now. She's riled as it is." She tugged Brave's arm in the opposite direction, pulling her away from the group.

Brave followed, but managed to look over her shoulder and mutter something Raven couldn't quite hear before giving it up.

"I see she still hasn't toughened up any…"

---

Raven stood steaming again, mad at the information she had been denied, yet unable to really blame anyone other than herself for allowing her to get in harm's way.

"That still doesn't explain why my powers suddenly disappeared." She managed to keep below a yell. She roughly brushed by the yellow emotion standing in front of her, and took to walking slowly around the perimeter of the room to try and cool off her nerves. Love and Knowledge decided to follow at a distance, realizing she could snap at them at any moment.

"It's quite simple, actually…" Knowledge started before she was cut off by her and Love tripping over a red-garbed emotion that suddenly emerged from an archway behind Raven.

"INSOLENT WRETCH!!" Rage got up, and used her power to catapult Knowledge across the room. This action, accompanied with her voice, immediately grabbed the attention of the others in the area.

"Hey!" Brave shouted as she ran over to put herself between the red and yellow cloaks in the room. "Leave her alone!"

"NEVER! THIS ROBIN ZEALOT MUST BE TAUGHT A LESSON." Raven turned around in time to catch a glimpse of brown before it disappeared, apparently taking Timid along with it.

"You think because Raven's angry, you can just go around beating us up?" Brave readied herself. No doubt, Raven's fit with Knowledge had left Rage surging with power.

"I CAN, AND I WILL" The demonic voice of Rage continued to rumble through the room. Friendship joined Brave by her side, visibly stricken with the reality that even with the two of them, they probably wouldn't be able to hold Rage off.

Raven noticed the distress, and started walking towards the blood-red emotion, when something grabbed her by the waist, and dragged her through a nearby portal. Thrashing around to catch a glimpse of who it was, Raven caught a sliver of yellow in her vision, despite the bright pink of the room she had been dragged into.

"What the-?!"

"I teleported behind you, and got you out." Knowledge stated, still carrying Raven further into the room. "They can deal with it on their own."

"Why? I need to go back in there-" Raven dug her feet into the ground, and tried to get back to the archway leading to the Common Room.

"NO!" Knowledge shouted, leaving Raven awestruck for a moment. Never in her life had she heard the emotion be so forceful with her words. "Rage is out of control, and you are in _no_ condition to fight. You'd be putting us _all_ at risk if you went back there. You need to _calm down_!" Raven continued to struggle in the girl's grasp, ignoring the pressure on her bruises.

"So you're just going to sacrifice the others?! They need help!" The distraught teen continued her attempts at advancing towards the door.

Knowledge threw her down into a pink, furry loveseat, and leaned over her to make sure she couldn't get up.

"_Listen_!" She snapped, bringing Raven's attention back to her. "They'll be fine. They've been battling all day." Knowledge squatted down so her eyes matched Raven's height. "If I didn't trust them, I wouldn't have left. _Your_ safety is more important right now." The blue of Raven's cloak had taken up a zebra print of its own accord as her power radiated from her body. When she finally took note of it, Raven relaxed a bit in the chair, slightly stunned at how true it had been that her powers could be stirred up by her inner turmoil.

"I need you to relax Raven." The yellow cloaked emotion explained and moved away now that Raven was no longer fighting for the door. "The less anger you have, the less power Rage will have to run rampant."

Raven took a deep breath, trying to calm down and put aside the fight going on just outside the archway in front of her.

"So, why are my powers back?" She asked, trying to get her mind on a new subject. "They were gone before I woke up in the bathtub."

"Simply put, you expend more energy in this state." Knowledge explained as she searched for a stool in the room. The one she found and sat down on happened to have a yellow smiley face for a seat. "As a typical fight-or-flight response, your energy output is tuned to its maximum. Not only does the power flow right off as you wish it, but it also drains your stamina quite quickly."

"So what little rest I got in the bathtub, was enough to gain back some of my power…" Raven derived.

"I would think you would find it difficult to create a simple barrier at this moment in time, but yes"

Just then, to Raven's left, Happy entered her main room alongside Lust.

At the mere sight of the two side by side, Raven groaned in her head. 'Anything possibly involving these two can only spell trouble.'

Lust continued to carry on her conversation with Happy, clearly unaware of Raven or Knowledge's presence in the room.

"One of these days, I'll find a way to fluff Garfield's garfield."

Raven's eyes widened.

"BB has a kitty?!" Happy clapped her hands together at the thought of Beast Boy having a cute little fur ball. The dark titan stood up, and practically leapt over to Lust in one motion, tackling her to the floor.

"Don't _ever_ speak of things like that _again_!" She threatened with a sharp, raspy voice. Happy reeled back in surprise at the sudden ambush, and Lust took a moment to gather her senses back.

"Awww, you _know_ you wanna do it." Lust egged on, then nodded in Happy's direction. "I bet it's _soft_ like a kitty too." she ended with a wink, and it drove Raven mad. The blue-garbed teen brought back her fist, and spikes of black formed from her knuckles.

"I can _make_ you shut up!" She yelled, plunging for the strike. But her arm stopped mid-swing as someone grabbed it from behind.

"I would _advise_ against that." Knowledge said, as she used her magic to aid in pulling Raven off of the burgundy emotion lying on the floor. "Destroying an emotion has been known to cause catastrophic events in one's persona and lifestyle."

"Oh yeah?" Raven spat, still being held back by the grasp of the yellow emotion. "Well I'm sure I can handle my life without this one!"

"P-please, why are kitties bad?" Happy cried out, wondering how such cute, fluffy animals could possibly be a bad thing.

The other three paused, and Knowledge let go of Raven to raise a hand to explain, but didn't have the nerve to tell the innocent emotion what Lust had really meant. Noticing this, the passionate emotion decided to push it further.

"What's the matter? _Cat_ got your tongue?" Her cocky demeanor enraged Raven even more, and soon after the comment, the stars punctuating the ether of her mind turned blood red, and all eyes averted up.

"Raven! Calm dow-" Knowledge yelled as she looked to where Raven had been at her side, and realized she wasn't there. Instead, the troubled teen was making a run for the door.

"Ra- DON'T!!" Knowledge tried to call out before the blue cloak completely disappeared through the portal.

"They need help!" Raven said with a worried tone over her shoulder just before she entered through the archway, and exited Happy's area of her mind.

"Stubborn little- c'mon guys, Rage needs to be subdued. She can't do it on her own." Knowledge started flying towards the door, and looked over her shoulder to see the other two still staring at the sky. "HURRY!"

Lust and Happy stared at each other.

"I'm glad she's on our side… I hate fighting four eyes." Lust grumbled. Happy simply nodded, and a rare expression of seriousness crossed her face.

"But if Raven's in trouble, we've gotta help them."

----------

To say the Common Room of Raven's mind was now _completely_ in ruin would be an understatement. As the dark girl herself entered the area through Happy's archway, she immediately noticed that the room almost seemed… alive. Rocks and debris were floating around and following random courses of their own, apparently being inadvertently controlled by Rage's excess power.

In the middle of the room stood Brave, unquestionably straining against Rage's attack on her shield. By her ankle, Friendship was trying to get up to a knee and help strengthen the barrier surrounding them. Clearly she was hurt, and they both seemed to be on the losing end of the battle. Out of the corner of her eye, Raven caught a glimpse of orange, and behind Rage, a shade of brown materialized through an archway, followed by –or rather dragging—Timid along with it. The mark of red in the sky had notified all of them of Rage's power, which to say the least, had gone through the roof. Raven started towards Brave's position to help, and over her shoulder, she could hear Rude.

"This should be fun to watch. How many Robin lovers does it take to beat one BB fan?"

Raven continued to make her way for the black bubble in the room as rapidly as possible, ducking beneath wandering boulders easily half her size and ignoring the yells from Knowledge behind her. With only a few feet between her and the black dome, Raven got the feeling something wasn't right.

Raven was just seconds away from coming to the rescue of her olive and lavender emotions, but Brave couldn't hold her shield much longer and didn't see her coming. The black shield before Brave gave way as the emotion ducked, and Rage's attack hurtled straight for the unnoticed teen behind her. Raven had little time to even react, but what barrier she _did_ erect in time, was torn through like tissue paper. In agonizing pain, Raven flew backward from the strike, and landed on her back. She could've sworn she heard an excruciating scream, though whether or not it had originated from her mouth she didn't know. Slowly, her vision faded to black, and she slipped into unconsciousness.

* * *

"_Never_!" Robin yelled out, as he jumped up from his chair so suddenly it toppled backwards behind him. "I _won't_ let you join us."

"I didn't say I wanted to _join_ you." Red X shook his head. "I asked to work _together_. Believe me, if I had it my way, I wouldn't be here. I'm merely looking out for Numero Uno."

"Why should we fight _your_ battles? Why shouldn't I just let you _rot_ behind bars?" Robin leaned across the table, one arm holding his weight while the other aided his speech.

"_Because_ kid, _I_ may be the one being hunted down, but _you_ were all part of the original plan."

"What plan?" Robin drew back a little. This involved more than just Red X. "Who are you working for?"

Red X leaned back in his seat.

"I work for nobody. When I said I went looking for something bigger- larger than what I've done, it was simply an agreement I made with myself to run a few errands for people looking for my particular… skills… in exchange for a higher payout. I never expected to get dragged into this."

"And what _is_ this" Robin pointed his finger and smashed it down into the table, hoping the masked villain would get to the point soon.

"If you had any _patience_, you'd know." Red X leaned forward, taunting Robin before he continued. "The tasks were all from different people, though now I know that they all worked for the same man; they were all part of a new group in town that call themselves The Blue Flame."

"So you did the errands, and got your money. What does this have to do with us?"

"The errands consisted of gathering up various artifacts around the city. Easy targets; something most people wouldn't miss, and for that matter, fairly useless. On the last trip, I made the mistake of asking one of my clients what they were for, and got cut off by a ring of swords pointing at my throat."

"And you didn't get paid. So you either fought them, and followed the man, or planted a tracking device on him." Robin collected.

"I guess you happen to be pretty smart _after_ all Robin." Red X grinned behind his mask. "I did both; I tracked him to just outside the city, in an old abandoned warehouse."

"That's some pretty cliché stuff… Why are you so afraid of this guy? You couldn't handle him on your own?" Robin was cooling off, almost feeling sorry for X's cowardice over such a typical-sounding bad guy.

"I wouldn't _be_ here if I could." Red X spat. "I snuck in to the compound, and found a few… files. Files on every one of you."

Robin's interest picked up.

"What makes you think it was us?"

"I don't forget a face Robin. Friend _or_ foe. Anyway, that's about all I found before some crazy guy with a glowing blue tattoo on his head interrupted my snooping."

"And you couldn't take care of him?" Robin asked incredulously.

"Let's just say the man can _fight_. That, and he has armies of followers at his disposal… I barely made it out alive." Red X trailed off as he hung his head in shame. "All I ask is that you keep me _here_. _Protected_. Whether you allow me to aid in getting rid of this _scum_ is up to you."

"How do I know you aren't using us for some sort of attack from the inside out?"

"What's the matter Robin? Terra's little betrayal still got you up in arms? The newspapers certainly had a heyday with that one. 'Hero turned villain! Read all about it! Titan's friend becomes their downfall!'"

"You're not helping your chances." Robin growled, the memory clearly not sitting well with the boy.

"I never thought I _could_." Red X remarked in a sarcastic tone. "We've worked together _before_ Robin. In fact, we've _both_ saved each other's _lives_. I can't possibly be _that_ bad, can I?" Robin let it sit with him for a minute as he remembered how they dealt with Professor Chang together, and how the man before him had personally cleared out the contestants racing for his private briefcase after he saved the man's life.

"Just because you don't play the hero…"

"Doesn't mean I don't know how." Red X finished as the doorbell rang.

"That still doesn't make what you've done right, or make you any less of a crook."

"So we agree on something." Red X said coolly.

Robin shifted his weight, trying to calculate the man's sincerity. In the end, he reluctantly decided to untie the man's bindings for now; without his belt, X wasn't much of a match for any of them anyway.

"I'll get back to you. This isn't finished yet." Robin left the room, and punched in a code on the door before heading upstairs.

* * *

All of Raven's emotions—including Rage who stopped her destruction to turn around—froze in place at the treacherous shriek and white glow emitting from none other than Timid, who collapsed to the floor clutching her head.

"Now!" Knowledge shouted. Most of the remaining emotions took the hint, and took advantage of Rage's preoccupation with the situation to attack. Soon, a small pile of girls found themselves on top of Rage, and the debris floating around the room dropped to the ground. A few seconds passed in silence, and some of the outer emotions began to relax just as a black dome lifted them off their target and sent them all flying in different directions.

"YOU DARE CHALLENGE ME?" Rage roared in response to the attack.

Rude got up and walked back in front of the red emotion.

"You know, I would've let you beat them to a pulp," She reached her target and narrowed her eyes before taking up a defensive stance, "But you hurt Raven, and _that_ requires me to open up a fresh can of whoop-ass."

Rage gave an evil grin, and brought her hand up to Rude's face. The others watched as a streak of orange flew past them to the far side of the room, surrounded by a black claw of energy.

"WHAT'S THE MATTER? DID THE CAN EXPIRE?" Rage slowly levitated towards the recovering emotion, and menacingly lifted a nearby boulder with her mind. "ONCE I RAZE YOU ALL, DOMINATION WILL BE MINE!"

Brave got up from her position, and removed her cloak as she marched up behind the menace in the room.

"Don't count on it" She warned with fervent conviction, and immediately grabbed Rage's hands, tying them up in the cloth.

Rage tried twisting around in Brave's grasp, and the boulder she was controlling followed the action before she broke her concentration from it; sending the mass in a direction no one seemed to care about until another dreadful scream enveloped the room. Timid who was now writhing about on the ground with a horror stricken face, gazed wide-eyed at the sight before her.

Everyone looked to where she was staring, and a few gasps filled the air.

"_Damn it_ Raven, _why_-" Knowledge growled out, as she lunged for Rage, hoping to help Brave subdue her. "_Why_ did you have to be so _stubborn_!" Lust and Rude joined in, but the others locked up, petrified at what had just happened. A few seconds later, Brave had the malefactor in a chokehold, and the room was overcome with a bright, white light that was so intense, Happy couldn't see her own hand when she held it a few inches from her face.

As the chaos faded away, it was only fair to say that no one really knew what to do next. Rage was taken care of, but there was a new problem at hand. The emotions gathered around Raven, who lay motionless on the ground before them, her body covered in rubble, and twisted in an odd position from the impact of the rogue boulder. There wasn't much blood aside from a few superficial scrapes, but there was no doubt she'd have internal bleeding and quite a few broken bones.

Sadness backed out of the circle, trying to get the sight out of her mind, as she began bawling. Happy's heart immediately dropped, and something welled up in her throat.

"Yo- you-! This is all YOUR FAULT!!" She screamed at Lust, who snapped back to reality to dodge a few furious swings from the pink-clad emotion.

"Hey! I wasn't the one fighting her- oof- Brave was!" Lust tried to pass the blame, so Happy would leave her alone.

"_We_… let her down." Friendship let out dejectedly, and grabbed onto Brave, who squeezed the emotion tight with one of her arms.

"Hey, I wasn't the one who got her all mad in the first place. Miss _Factual_ managed to do that all on her own." Brave glared over at the yellow emotion who knelt down next to Raven. "_I_ was trying to _control_ the situation."

"Not that it matters, but Rude helped." Love added apathetically.

"Did not! She was completely fine when I left!" Rude countered. "It was _you_ screwballs that messed her up!"

"Enough!" Knowledge interrupted the argument. "What's done is done. Nothing's going to change it now. If you want to waste energy, I suggest you help _heal _her instead of arguing over something as pointless as whose fault it is."

"Or…" Sadness sniffled while tapping Knowledge on the shoulder. "Introduce the newbies." She pointed behind her where three emotions backed away as all eyes turned to them.

"Great. Just great." Brave muttered out, and reached down to grab Raven's cloak and put it on.

"What the _hell_ do you think you're doing?" Knowledge demanded, and the others gave her puzzled looks as well.

"_Me_? I'm covering for her!" She motioned to Raven. "You know just as well as I do, how long it will take to get her healed up, and we can't just toss her out, hoping that someone will find her."

"You're not going to…" Knowledge trailed off, realizing what Brave was going to do. "There's a _reason_ it's called the _forbidden_ door."

"Rules are meant to be broken; especially in extreme circumstances." Brave retorted. "Everyone will get suspicious if she suddenly disappears for too long."

"Why don't you just go find the others and have them come get her?" Friendship suggested. Brave turned to the lilac emotion and scoffed.

"Have you been paying attention? She doesn't want _anyone_ in here. _Ever_." She barked out. "That's the _one_ rule that I'm not willing to break."

"But what about that time you said BB and…"

"She had a meltdown for a week, and we all got blamed for it." Knowledge cut her off. "Robin still doesn't know this place exists. Don't you think that if she kept it a secret from her leader, that perhaps she doesn't want _anyone_ to know about it in the first place, let alone come here?"

Friendship withdrew, and gave up on her idea with the two bickering at her over it.

"I guess not." She replied sheepishly.

Brave nodded, and started walking towards an archway leading to the realm containing the forbidden door.

"Hold up." Rude barged in front of the now blue-cloaked Brave with her hands on her hips. "How come _you_ get to be the one to go out there? What makes _you_ so special?"

"Who else has the guts to do it, and deal with Raven after? _Hmm_?" Brave replied mockingly.

"_I _wouldn't mind it if I didn't have to train those new _brats_." Rude swept her hand in the general direction of the pale-white, grey, and black emotions, who shrunk away at the comment. She looked over at them.

"Welcome to the family, by the way." She added almost as an afterthought, without much welcome in her voice, and the addition of a glare.

"I hope you're not _serious_." Brave laughed incredulously. "They would _never_ believe you were the real Raven. You couldn't act like her to save your pathetic life." Se quipped. "Now get out of my way."

Rude huffed, and watched as Brave exited through the seldom-used archway.

"Everyone's just going to leave it all in her hands, huh?" She grumbled quietly to no one in particular.

Figuring it best not to dwell on Brave's decision and get to the work at hand, Knowledge piped up.

"Alright everyone, let's get Raven a bed and get to work." She addressed the group of girls. Turning to the three behind her, she quickly shuttled them through Timid's archway, leaving the rest to set everything up.

"So… Timid…" She pointed to the familiar grey-clad emotion, and thought before pointing to the other two. "Fear, and… Innocence?" Knowledge pointed to the black then off-white emotions respectively. They all nodded in unison.

"Alright. I'm sorry there's not much of a welcoming party… we're kinda in the middle of a crisis right now. Although… maybe no welcome party is a good thing for you guys." Knowledge realized, thinking about how too many people would be stressful on the emotions in question.

"Timid will just have to bring you up to speed for now, until things get back under control again."

With that, they watched the yellow-clad emotion disappear through the archway in front of them, and stood in silence.

* * *

Cyborg reached the front door, and found a man holding a stack of pizza's and a box of wings waiting outside.

"Hey!" He greeted the man, "Here, let me take those for you." The man handed over the pizzas to Cyborg who noticed a light blue tattoo on the man's arm as he grabbed them.

"Thanks. You've got a cool ride set up with the city for deliveries." The man commented on the speedboat the city had given to the Titans as a gift for shuttling visitors back and forth to the Tower. Naturally, a city official who worked at the docks was in charge of keeping track of and allowing who could access the boat, and among the long list of legal forms covering penalties for misuse and misconduct were the signatures of most of the pizza and Chinese delivery workers in town who had been authorized to use it.

"Aww, I know. She's sweet ain't she?" Cyborg cooed. "Is she still handling like a dream?"

The man laughed.

"Yeah, smooth as velvet."

"So how much do I owe ya?"

"Aww nothing," The man waved Cyborg away. "It's an honor to deliver pizza to the Titans... And to get to drive a sweet boat on top of it!"

"You sure?" Cyborg asked, slightly surprised.

"Yeah, no problem. Hey, I heard you guys might have had a run-in with Red X this morning. What happened?"

"Uhh… yeah, we did actually. Man, news travels fast… it didn't happen very long ago." Cyborg scratched his head. "We uhh… got him, and Robin's interrogating him. You _sure_ I don't need to pay you anything?"

"Yeah, It's totally fine." The man dismissed Cyborg again, "It was the dock master who said he saw Red-X show up while he was watching you guys train. Apparently you're his entertainment for the day."

"Oh. Huh. Well, uh… thanks again for the pizza!" Cyborg said.

"No problem" The man smiled, and turned back for the boat. Cyborg shut the door with a puzzled look on his face.

"That was weird."

* * *

Robin exited the stairwell, and walked down the hall to the Common Room for pizza. As he passed a certain door, he heard a dull thump from inside the room, and noticed it was Raven's. He stopped, and decided to knock.

"Uh… Raven?" He called. "You alright?" He heard shuffling in the room, and decided she hadn't heard him.

"Raven… the pizza's he-" The door cracked open to reveal Raven's face, and he noticed that the cuff adorning her wrist was green.

"Robin! Come in." Raven opened the door to let him in her room. The boy stood for a moment, scratching the back of his head.

"Uhh… okay?" His confusion only grew when he looked down to see the green boots in place of her usual blue ones. "You… you sure you're alright?"

"Yeah." She responded flatly. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"You're acting weird and wearing green. I have my suspicions." Robin crossed his arms across his chest, and raised an eyebrow at the girl. 'Raven' realizing her mistake of not switching or hiding her green attire from the boy, blushed.

"Uh… I decided I might try out a new color…" She said sheepishly. "But this green… Bleh… I don't like it." She tried to fake disgust at her clothes and fetched some blue boots from the closet.

"Does this have something to do with Beast Boy?" Robin questioned. After all, why else would Raven be looking at green things? "Did he put you up to this?"

"No." She slipped off her boots, and stuffed her feet into the new blue ones. She was trying not to look Robin in the eye, both for the fear of him reading her lies and for other… romantic reasons.

"You sure? You two seem like you're getting along better these days…" Robin trailed off. She had been opposed to letting anyone talk to her all day, yet since he left her and Beast Boy alone in the Rec Room with Red X, she suddenly was being very open and not nearly as pissed at him.

'Did she figure out whatever it was, and deal with it?' He questioned himself. He decided to finish his statement very cautiously.

"Do you… have like…" He laughed nervously. "…Like a crush on him?"

Raven whirled around on the bed, and faced the masked teen who took a few steps backward. Her glare continued to intensify.

"Let me get this through your thick head." She stood up, and backed him into a corner, making sure she was in his face as much as possible. "Beast Boy will _forever_ be a _never_ in my book."

She bit out the words with overwhelming conviction, and found she was practically smashing him into the corner of her room. Robin raised his hands, and surrendered.

"Sorry I mentioned it." He replied nervously.

Robin half expected Raven to back off or throw him out a window when he did this, but she hovered for a few seconds, her eyes caught in his and their faces just inches apart. Her face showed she was struggling with something, and he grew worried. Suddenly she snapped back to reality, and turned away again.

"Don't be." She mumbled, as she walked back to her bed to sit down. The room grew awkwardly silent for a few moments while she mulled things over in her head.

"Why were you looking for me anyway?"

Robin stayed glued to the corner of her room, clearly freaked out by Raven's odd behavior.

"I uh… the…we…" He couldn't get anything out of his mouth.

'What the hell was that all about?!' He yelled in his mind. 'If she doesn't have a crush on BB… then does..? No.' He tried getting the thought out of his head, but it only settled in deeper. 'She can't possibly… why would she..? There's no way she could...' The confused arguing continued as he mumbled out incoherencies to Raven.

"Pizza." He finally found the word he was searching for.

"Oh. Well… I'm not really hungry, and I'm kind of tired." Raven tried to make an excuse, knowing the more she had to interact with the others, the harder it would be to keep up the charade. Robin slowly removed himself from the corner, and made his way for the door.

"Oh." He responded. He needed to get out of there before things got any weirder. "Well, I guess I'll let you get to sleep then." He opened the door, and looked back to Raven who was in deep thought on the bed.

"Robin?" She called out.

"Yeah?"

"Just don't tell Beast Boy. In fact… let's just forget this whole meeting happened." She muttered with worry in her voice. "Deal?"

"Deal." Robin agreed, and quickly shut the door.

As he turned into the hallway, he let out a breath he hadn't noticed he was holding.

'She's just having a few troubles.' Robin tried to reassure himself. 'She wouldn't have a crush on you… you're just making things up.' He reached the Common Room doors, and stood before them, staring at the colored blobs of his reflection in the matte aluminum surface. His heart -much like the metal before him- turned cold, and took a plunge to his stomach.

'But it explains her weird behavior perfectly.'

* * *

**Uh oh. *Runs for cover from angry BB/Rae fans* So Cy straight up extinguishes Beast Boy's little flame for Raven, and now the Robin loving Brave is out on the loose. This should be interesting... Cy meets a strange fellow who delivers pizzas for free, and Robin finds out about a group known as The Blue Flame. As for Raven, I hope she's okay. (And her emotions for that matter.) What comes next? I have a week-ish to figure it out! :D **

**Please drop a review and let me know what you think about all this nonsense thats going on. I'd be happy to hear your thoughts on it all! The emotions... The Blue Flame... Brave being out in the real world... anything really. Heck, I might even reply to something about jam on toast! (Though not entirely likely.)**

**Until Next Time,**

**~VVoD**


	7. PlacidPurveyors of ParadoxicalPerfection

**This ended up as somewhat of a transition chapter. Not much action, but it's spiced up with some humor I hope doesn't get me in too much trouble... Good thing I don't own the Teen Titans. ;)**

* * *

**Chapter 7: Placid Purveyors of Paradoxical Perfection**

"Hey buddy!" Robin broke out of his trance as the metal teen's hand slammed down on his shoulder. "You alright?"

"Wha- uh, yeah." Robin looked away from the door to see Cyborg holding a stack of pizzas in his hand with a smaller box on top.

"You sure? You're just staring at the doorway like BB would a physics test." Cyborg reached over and pressed the button to open the door to the Common Room.

"I uh… just have a lot on my mind. That's all." Robin tried to shrug it off as best he could, and entered the Common Room with his teammate; his gaze on the floor. Something in the back of his mind nagged him for telling a lie, but another part of him knew that the matter at hand had no place being mentioned in Cyborg's company.

"If you say so." Cyborg replied, and glided down the stairs heading for the table. Robin followed slowly, thinking.

'Besides, you don't even know if she _does_ like you. It's just a suspicion. A weakly constructed one at that.' He looked up to find Bumblebee setting out glasses for drinks.

"Mmmm-mm. Smells good already." Bumblebee commented as Cyborg dropped the pizzas on the table in front of her.

"All except this one…" Cyborg pulled out one particular box, and separated it far from the rest. "Pineapples and anchovies just shouldn't mix." He wrinkled his nose as he pulled his hand away in disgust.

Bumblebee let out a giggle and walked over to the refrigerator.

"What do you guys wanna drink?" She leaned into the fridge, "You've got Mr. Fizzles, Lemony Fresh, Dr. Cherry, Caf-Pow, and... Meaty Meat?"

Robin, ignoring her completely, looked around the room and found that they were the only three there.

"Hey guys, where is everyone?"

Cyborg laughed a little, realizing they never threw away the cup of meat juice from the alien restaurant, and turned to Robin.

"Rae hasn't been here at all, and I don't know where Star ran off to… I think she said something about changing?" Cy tried to explain.

"Yeah, but that was a while ago." Bee added on. "As for BB, Mr. Big Brother here decided to go run him off to the roof."

"What made you do that?" Robin glared over at Cyborg, looking for an answer.

"Uhhuhmmm..." He scratched his head nervously. "He needed advice?"

"More like he told the green fellow not to go after Raven because she-mmmph" Cyborg slapped his hand over Bumblebee's mouth while he was still ahead.

"Because she... uh... would only get annoyed if he went bugging her." Cy tried to cover up with an excuse. "Y'know, cuz she's probably tired an' all like this morning."

"Well, what kind of advice was he looking for?" Robin asked skeptically at the blatant excuse, clearly confused as to what advice Beast Boy would possibly go looking for from Raven.

Bumblebee managed to push Cyborg's hand away from her mouth.

"Let's just say it had something to do with relationships." She responded. "And it ended with him storming out of the room..." She looked over to her boyfriend. "We're probably the _last_ two people he wants to see right now."

"So you're saying _I_ should go get him." Robin bit out with a disgruntled look on his face. He hated having to run around cleaning up after other people's messes.

Bumblebee put on her best 'pretty please' smile and nodded.

"He probably wouldn't be as mad if it was you."

Robin sighed.

"Fine. I'll go get him and see what Star's up to." He grumbled as he turned for the door, muttering angry incoherencies under his breath.

"Aren't you forgetting about someone? Perhaps a little dark angel?" Cyborg teased.

Wandering thoughts about his encounter with the girl not moments ago entered his mind again.

"If she's hungry, she'll come. If not..." He glared back as the doors shut behind him. "_I'm_ not going to be the one to bother her."

* * *

Beast Boy sat atop the tower, dangling his feet off the edge of the roof, and gazed into the water. The sun had finally begun to find weaknesses in the shield of clouds that hung over the city, and the water was patched with splotches of light blue. Above them, streaks of white were pointing like arrows towards the radiant light source above and beyond. Quietly, he mulled over what Cyborg had said in the Common Room.

---

"...I'm sure as hell Raven could probably see it as well. Wouldn't you think she'd _say_ something after all this time if she knew you liked her? "

---

The spot of light that had warmed up his skin for the past few minutes moved away, and in the shade, a sudden chill crept back over him.

'He's right.' The changeling hung his head even lower. 'Of all people, Raven would be able to see it. Even if I couldn't.' He gazed out solemnly onto the bay, propping his head up with one hand, whose elbow dug deep into the flesh above his knee. A few seconds passed as he watched a speedboat circle around the Tower.

'Maybe _that's_ why she never laughs at any of my jokes, or even smi-' He paused, and looked up to the horizon.

"Wait a sec... If she _knew_, why wouldn't she just say no?" A new wind of hope rushed through the boy as an afternoon breeze rushed through his green hair. He took a deep breath of the ocean air, but then something else dawned on him that kept him holding it in tight.

"But why wouldn't she say yes?" He thought about it for a few moments before exhaling; a toothy grin slowly growing wide across his face.

"I bet she just doesn't want to _admit_ it." He mischievously muttered, the tomfoolery only fueling his grin even more.

"Admit what?"

Beast Boy nearly leapt out of his skin and off the side of the Tower at the sound of Robin's voice.

"I-uh... that- y- ya know... ummmm..." He laughed nervously before cautiously questioning the Boy Wonder. "How long have you been standing there?"

"Long enough to know you're up to your usual tricks." Robin rolled his eyes, and walked up behind Beast Boy on the roof's ledge, looking out at the water as well. "So what is it this time… Grease filled balloons? More bad jokes? Stealing one of her books? Or is it something _completely_ insane like…" he took a few moments to think about it. "...kissing her."

Beast Boy thought it over.

"Actually, I hadn't thought about that one..." He trailed off at the thought of pressing his lips to hers, and after swiftly being whisked away, coming back to nag her until she admitted she liked it. It was pure genius indeed.

Robin shrugged.

"Guess you're starting to rub off on me."

The two sat in silence for a moment, both of their minds on separate things involving the same person. After a while, Robin started to smirk.

"Whad'ya say. Twenty bucks if you can get close enough to her and actually pull it off?"

The changeling turned around and laughed.

"See Robin, and here I thought you were the _mature_ one." He stood up and grinned at his leader.

"You'd be surprised at how much this mask can hide, young grasshopper." Robin advised 'wisely', managing to keep a stare and a straight face through it.

After a short pause, he raised an eyebrow.

"By midnight?"

"Deal." Beast Boy shook his hand.

Robin inwardly smiled. This would be the most definitive test he had in finding out Raven's true feelings for Beast Boy. He had a sneaking suspicion that she had been overcompensating with her little outburst towards him.

'As Batman always said: 'You can always _talk_ easily through a façade, but it's when you face the _real thing_ that you find out a man's _true_ feeling on the subject'.' It was all about breaking down that barrier Raven was hiding behind. He knew that somewhere, deep down, she had to feel _something_ for the green boy, and he was willing to put Beast Boy in some danger—nothing he wasn't used to of course—to find out just what it was.

"So... what's the deal with your evil twin?" Beast Boy asked. "Was he conscious when you got down there?"

Robins face hardened and he turned for the stairwell.

"We've got a few problems." His tone went cold as he stopped at the door. "C'mon,... the pizza's here. I'll talk it over with you guys while we eat."

Beast Boy turned back to the horizon.

"I'll be down in a minute. You can go ahead and start without me."

Robin looked confused for a moment, and then put two and two together.

"You don't have to worry about that kiss just yet; she's not going to be there." Robin called out. "She wasn't hungry when I asked, and she was gonna go back to sleep."

"Thanks for your concern Romeo, but that's not the reason why."

Slightly insulted, Robin decided to prod Beast Boy for going outside his normal vocabulary.

"Do you even _know_ who Romeo is?"

"_Ha-ha_, very funny. Of _course_ I know who Romeo is." The changeling said matter-of-factly. "He's that dude from that book Romeo and Julienne."

"You mean... Juliet?" Robin teasingly corrected.

"Ok fine! Whatever. I was close enough." Beast Boy glared back at his teammate. "Can't a green guy have a few moments of fresh air to think by himself?"

At this request, Robin took a gracious bow towards his friend.

"As you wish your Royal Greenness." He playfully retorted and headed down the stairs.

"Ass." The changeling muttered under his breath, but he couldn't _quite_ hold back the smile crawling across his face.

'At least I'm starting to rub off on _someone_.'

* * *

Timid practically collapsed into the arms of her two new sisters the moment Knowledge left her realm. She had just been through an ordeal, and now she couldn't stop thinking about what was going to happen to Raven.

"Ar- are you alright?" Fear asked, trying to help Innocence get Timid back on her feet.

Timid opened her eyes for a second, realizing something soft was brushing against her clammy skin. What she found was the material both her sisters were draped in; soft silks that had been dyed a rich, foreboding black, and an angelic creamy white. It almost seemed like she had two proverbial angels on each of her shoulders when she looked up; the sides of light and dark…angel and devil looking down upon her through hooded cloaks. At first glance, she was afraid of the shadowlike figure looming over her left side, but then realized Fear would never hold the character of a devil.

"I- I don't know anymore."

"What's the emergency?" Innocence immediately asked, as it was one of the many curious questions floating around in her head. "Why were the others all arguing?"

Timid bit her tongue. She knew what was going on; she witnessed it first-hand, yet sometimes things were better left unsaid. The last thing she wanted to do was have to live through the horrid vision that played out before her again, let alone have to explain it to someone else. Even if she did, this was Innocence. She was worried that revealing the actions would tarnish the emotion's mind, bringing Raven that much closer to accepting evil as a common, everyday occurrence. Instead, she let out a whimper, trying to hold back her tears.

"Stop asking questions! You're gonna make her cry." The black-laden emotion cried out, pulling Timid in a tight grip and away from Innocence. "I don't want to see the only friend I have crying."

Innocence took a step back, not realizing she had done something wrong. After a moment of thought, she decided to direct her questions at Fear instead, cocking her head ever so curiously.

"How do you know she's our friend?" The off-white emotion asked.

Fear's eyes widened, and she immediately loosened her grip, dropping Timid unceremoniously to the floor.

"But we-we came from her." She pointed to Timid, backing away. "Wh-why _wouldn't_ she b-b-be our friend?"

* * *

Knowledge entered what was left of the Common Room in Raven's mind, and noticed that all but Sadness had left with Raven. The moping brown figure sat beside a doorway, her head hung between upright knees, silently sobbing. As Knowledge padded her way over to Sadness, her bright cloak caught the emotion's eyes and she stopped her sobbing, and lifted her head.

"Th-they went in there." The brown cloaked emotion sniffled as she pointed to the archway behind her. "I just… I can't see her like this." She hung her head low in shame.

Knowledge moved closer to the emotion, trying her best to be compassionate, and rested a hand on a brown-colored shoulder.

"It's okay. We'll make sure she gets better."

Sensing the penitence Sadness was holding, Knowledge thought up the most logical solution to benefit all parties involved.

"If you don't think you can help us, why don't you go talk to Timid and her new sisters? I'm sure she'll be tired, and they'll probably have a lot of questions."

Sadness simply nodded at the words, trying to hold back everything she felt about Raven, and stood before heading for the appropriate archway in silence.

Knowledge looked back, watching her, and shook her head.

"It's no wonder people hate relationships." She muttered silently to herself. "They always tear the best of friends apart."

As the brown of Sadness' cloak disappeared, she looked around at the completely destroyed room, and decided to include yet another annotation.

"Not to mention, they bring out the worst in people."

Turning back, she stepped over a small pile of rocks, and slipped through the portal before her.

* * *

"Oww..." Timid grumbled.

"Well, I don't think she'll _want_ to be your friend after _that_."

"I-I- I didn't-"

"What's going on?" Sadness asked as the scene before her came into view.

"I swear!" Fear jumped at the sound of Sadness' voice. "I didn't mean it!" She darted behind a statue vaguely resembling a grim reaper. As she hid behind it, the tattered hem of her black cloak billowed around the sides in a manner that suited the statue very well.

"You dropped her!" Innocence accused, looking back to Sadness for some clue as to what to do next.

"Y-you said she wasn't our friend." Fear sheepishly muttered, and backed herself behind the statue so that now only half of her face could be seen.

Sadness sighed, and went to help a dazed Timid off the ground.

"It's okay. Just stop _fighting_." She managed without too much sorrow evident in her timbre.

'Azar only knows Raven doesn't need more fighting emotions... especially not now.'

"You mean it's _okay_ to drop someone if they aren't your friend?" Innocence asked, clearly befuddled by the response.

"It-... nevermind." Sadness immediately gave up on explaining to the emotion. If one thing was certain, dealing with these two would most likely get her mind _far, far_ away from Raven.

"You two find a seat; I'll be back in a minute." She addressed the new emotions, and with that, the she sank steadily through the floor, taking Timid along with her.

Innocence looked on in amazement, her jaw nearly touching the floor until the two were completely gone.

"That. Was so... COOL!" She exclaimed like a little schoolgirl. "How the heck did she do that?" The white emotion looked over to the statue, and found that Fear had now hidden entirely behind it.

"I d-don't know, but I don't like it." Came a whimpering voice from behind the solid figure.

* * *

The green room she entered made sense. After all, its tenant was now gone, but she wished—if anything—they would have chosen her room instead. Knowledge felt that even if it _was_ only due to circumstance, that _she_ was the one at fault, and it was _her_ duty to make things right.

That and her room was _so_ much more organized.

She carved a beeline through the room, and caught a glimpse of a girl in red laid out on a padded weight lifting bench. Her arms were still tied behind her back with Brave's cloak, and a cushion had been placed beneath her head. Walking cautiously up to the sight, she came behind a rather high-backed chair, and found a pair of crimson boots hanging over the side.

"I figure the more comfortable she is, the less likely she'll want to wake up." Lust mentioned as she began flipping through an old book to a page she had marked with a ribbon. "And since Rae and I don't exactly get along, I figured _someone_ has to keep an eye on Miss PMS in case she decides to get up."

Knowledge simply nodded, understanding the logic and looked from the sleeping Rage to the book in Lust's hands.

"Did you steal one of my boo-?" The spectacled emotion stopped her sentence the moment she read the title. Honestly, she didn't think any of the other emotions _had_ any books; they usually all borrowed them from her. But this particular one was _certainly_ not one of her own.

"Nooo..." Lust let out in one of her more mischievously seductive tones. "But you can _borrow_ it if you want..." Her lips curled up ever so slowly. "I'm sure even _you_ could learn a few new things from it."

At this, Knowledge let out a gasp, and used her magic to promptly shut the book, and pull it to her hand.

"Do you always have to be so snide?" She scolded, but was immediately ignored.

"Go ahead, Miss Prudy-Prude, _take_ it. I know you're just hiding the fact that you're _curious_ about what's inside." Lust teased. "I bet you're just _dying_ to go lock yourself in a room and read it through."

Knowledge promptly gave out a huff and disapprovingly threw the book to the floor.

"You-!" She tried to keep her tone steady and pointed, "...are nothing more than an _out_-of-control primal emotion. Simple, crude, and most _unpleasantly_ part of something meant to be cherished between two-"

"_Simple_? Un_pleasant_?" Lust scoffed. "Darling, all that I _stand_ for is _pleasure_." She sat up to make her point. "And perhaps you didn't _notice_, but it takes much more _cunning _and _mind_ to playfully wrap a suitor around your finger than you give me credit fo-"

"It's no _wonder_ no one around here likes you!" Knowledge tried to keep below a yell so as not to wake Rage. "All you _do_ is dirty up our thoughts with _useless_ and _un_wanted images."

Lust let silence fall between them, a smile still plastered on her face.

"You're just mad that Robin would never let her _do_ any of these things." She bent over the side of the green chair to pick her book back up off the ground. "It's not _my_ fault if I have feelings for someone who can be just as... _primal_."

Knowledge promptly turned and headed straight for the archway to Brave's bedroom.

"_You're impossible_." She muttered angrily, her steps becoming more and more deliberate. "I'm _not_ going over this conversation _again_."

Lust watched with a smirk on her face as the yellow emotion swiftly left her presence and disappeared through the door. She reverted to sprawling herself out laterally on the chair while humming a light, but drawn out tune, and leaned back as she opened her book once more.

"Oh... but a _beast_, on which I will _feast_, till the end of Nevermore."

* * *

"So a kiss it _is_ then..." Beast Boy paced along the ledge, trying to work up his nerve. After Robin had left, he had completely forgotten what it was he wanted to think about, as thoughts of this new 'prank'—and Raven—filled his mind.

"So she's going to hide away and play hard to get, eh?" He jumped off the roof, immediately transforming into a hawk, and dove down a few floors; his wings tucked in for the ultimate freefall. The feeling of weightlessness had become something he'd grown accustomed to, and he loved every second of it. Spreading out his wings, he abruptly pulled out of the dive and circled the Tower a few times, letting the thermals from the island lift him back up to a certain floor. Once he reached it, he promptly morphed into a hummingbird, and flitted around a particular window, whose shades were surprisingly drawn.

'Let's see... what can I do to get her out of her room?' He thought as he tried gazing into the dark room. When his eyes adjusted, he found it surprisingly empty. His suspicions about Robin's claim she wouldn't be there for pizza slowly started to rise.

'Dude! She's not sleeping... Heck, she's not even in her r- oooom....?' Before he had finished, a leotard had been thrown onto the bed from some hidden corner of Raven's room.

As he looked on, mouth agape, he didn't notice the green cuffs adorning the article of clothing or any of the _other_ green objects, for that matter. What he _did_ notice, was the situation he had come upon, and what would arise if she found him. Immediately he lost his concentration and just outside her window, he morphed back into his human form.

----------

'What were you thinking?!' Brave scolded herself as she slipped into one of Raven's leotards. 'You probably just screwed everything up for her.' She didn't want to admit it, but her attempt so far at covering for Raven had already gone horribly wrong.

'Not only did he see you in green, but you scared him into a corner and…' Her cheeks rosied up a little. 'You almost kissed him.'

That wasn't to say she didn't _want_ to with every fiber of her being, but something about forcing the outcome on Raven just didn't feel right.

'If you don't keep yourself under control, pretty soon you're gonna end up like another little Miss 'Red Rum' in her eyes.' She grabbed the blue cloak that had been draped over a rack in the closet, and clasped it in place with the ruby brooch. 'Azar only _knows_ how long it will take her to recover from this _latest_ incident.'

Now finished with dressing herself, she grabbed everything green off the bed, and wrapped it up in her old leotard. Thinking of no better place to put it, she tossed it into the bottom of Raven's closet and closed the door. She gave out a troubled sigh and in a manner very unlike the teen she was pretending to be, Brave dove onto Raven's bed. Perhaps this whole 'cover for Raven' idea was going to be tougher than she thought. She rolled onto her back and looked from the mirror at the side of the bed, to the door, to the ceiling.

"What can I do? It's not like I need to meditate, and I'm in no mood for a book." Her eyes took another sweep through the room, over the bookshelves, statues, and bedding before they paused again at the door.

"Robin thinks I'm sleeping, so I doubt running into anyone else is a good idea." She thought to herself. Even still, she didn't exactly feel like meeting them right away, especially not all at once. It was the first time she had ever felt the urge not to meet the other Titans in person. Sure, she was bold and _definitely_ brave, but somehow, being outside her world was putting a damper on things.

'If I didn't have to act so in-character, I'd be all over this.' She argued with herself, frustrated with all the restraints she would have to put in place to keep her little charade a secret. 'I mean… why can't she just be more _brave_ someti-'

She suddenly froze, and her eyes slowly moved to gaze upon the mirror at the side of the bed. She sat up, and her eyes wandered over the reflective surface, realizing her new found opportunity.

"Maybe I'm going about this all wrong." She pondered precariously. "If _she's_ been too worried about letting her emotions out… maybe _I_ can help set them in place; give her somewhere to start."

Her eyes narrowed, and her face became stern. "_Starting_ with _me_."

* * *

Robin had made his way down the stairs from the roof, and was just a few steps away from Starfire's door. This day was getting very strange; almost too strange for him to handle. First, Raven had snapped at him all morning, then Red X had come _looking_ for them for _help_, at which point the team utterly fell apart. Then _Bumblebee_ magically appeared to save the day due to some sort of _romantic_ relationship with _Cy;_ Raven had suddenly… changed—for lack of a better word—and now BB was one to go thinking to himself alone on the roof.

'What's next?' He asked himself, 'Is Star going to be in some sort of depression?'

He stepped in front of the door and the large black letters spelling out her name loomed in front of him. The room sounded quiet, and for a moment he almost wished he could take back his last few thoughts. Bringing his hand up to the door, he went to knock, but was immediately greeted with a flash of purple and orange before he found himself lying backwards on the floor.

"Robin!" The familiar worried scream from the Tamaranian girl quickly snapped him back to focus and he took her outstretched hand.

"I am sorry, for I did not see you standing outside my door." She quickly apologized.

Robin stood up, and brushed himself off.

"Don't worry about it Star, I'm fine."

Finding his words sincere, she tilted her head curiously, and concerned herself with a different -more pressing- matter.

"Please, why is it you were accompanying the space outside my doorway?"

The Boy Wonder blushed a little, realizing how the situation must have looked.

"Um, I was about to knock." He replied sheepishly. "The pizza's here, and I was promoted to 'missing Titan messenger.'" Robin let out a slight grumble with the last part.

"Oh." Starfire comprehended his words. Suddenly, their situation became a lot less awkward than it had been.

"I… see you changed like Cy said." Robin decided for small talk over suffering in awkward silence.

Starfire let out a big smile.

"Yes! I am no longer covered in the repulsive substance from our foe." Realizing the mention of their 'foe' wasn't boding well with the boy, she started floating down the hallway. Robin followed at her side and silence once again filled the space between the two. This time, it was Starfire's turn to break the silence.

"Tell me Robin, is it not the most wondrous thing to see Cyborg has found a companion to share 'the love' with?" She asked joyously, yet cautiously, trying to fully grasp the boy's feelings on the subject.

"Uhmm..." His face flushed white. 'Not this again.'

"I... guess so..." Maybe it would have been easier to bear the silence after all.

"So you truly do _not_ feel the great joy in having a relationship." Starfire continued in disappointment.

He turned to the disheartened teen, unsure of how to save himself.

"C'mon Star, I don't mean it like that. It's just…"

"That you merely find the joining of two people in happiness to be crippling to a team effort?" Her tone was getting angrier now that her fears about what Cyborg said were becoming truer by the second.

"Well… when you put it that way…" Robin had no other choice. He was caught and there was no one to bail him out.

"Tell me something _Robin_, is it not the point of joining two people in love, to make them stronger as one?"

"Star, I-"

"Is there really such a difference between the love of your teammates, and the love of another, that it truly hinders their ability to fi-"

"_Star_!"

She froze in the hallway, and immediately, the guilt struck him when he realized what he had done.

"Yes, Robin?" Her tone was no longer happy; no longer worried, nor angry. She simply bowed her head, and settled to the floor.

"I'm not going to punish them, or tell them to separate. If Cy's happy, I'm not going to change that." He knew that touching her right now would be beyond a bad idea, so instead, he turned down the hall and looked away from her saddened eyes.

"I just… don't think it's the best idea."

He hoped to God that was all it would be—that he would have the last word, and be able to go on and finish his day relatively intact—but unfortunately, whatever God he prayed to didn't seem to be on his side today.

"In other words…" Starfire trailed off. "…you would never want to have the feelings of love for another."

The words stung his heart, and he held back every urge he had to slam his head through the metal door before them. Instead, he kept a relative cool about him and opened the door with a heavy sigh. He really didn't have anything to say to that remark; siding with _one_ part of his mind would only wind up _betraying_ the other. For a moment, he realized this must be exactly how Raven always felt. Torn between good and evil; between emotion and apathy, control and chaos. It was an unpleasant feeling, but undoubtedly a necessary evil.

"C'mon Star, the pizza's getting cold." He said dejectedly, desperately trying to convince himself in his head that 'it's what's best for the team.'

Then, in a manner not unlike when they had been stranded on an alien planet, she quickly composed herself and gave out a huff before marching by him, entering the room.

"That's _Kori_ to you."

* * *

**_Robin..._ you idiot. Stop acting like a goofball who denies his love. Seriously. **

**So everyone's gathering for pizza, except BB, who's currently falling from the side of the tower in shock, and 'Raven' who sounds like she's up to no good. Meanwhile, Sadness is taking care of Timid before lecturing our newbie emotions, Lust and Knowledge have a little scuffle, and the rest are off healing Raven. Robin's kinda all over the board this chapter. He goes from fear of Raven, to disgust with Cy and Bee making him run errands, to trouble-maker with BB, to complete moron with Star. How many faces can this guy hide behind his mask? Good luck with that lecture on Red X buddy!**

**Also, give yourself 100 cool points if you recognized Caf-Pow, and another 100 if you know what old-school movie I got the idea for 'Lemony Fresh' from. (Hint: it has to do with a devil from down under.)**

**Let me know what you think! Until next time,**

**~VVoD**


	8. Interlude

_So here we are... it's been quite some time, and nothing's happened. I'm really sorry, but there's been a lot going on, and I've been stressed to the max lately. Don't worry, the next chapter has been sent out, and is being looked over by my trusty Beta N.o.S., who is also under a bit of stress himself. The next chapter altogether is about 13k words (about 3 of my average chapters), and will be split into two simultaneously uploaded chapters, so it's not like I haven't been doing anything!_

_In the meantime, I've decided as a little break from my uber workload at school, to write up a small little interlude for you folks. It's a little crazy, wonky, and there's probably some huge gaping holes in it as far as plot. Just bear with it, as it serves no purpose other than a short piece of entertainment. Just keep in mind (to get it out asap) it hasn't been Beta-ed either. Just my own editing eyes. ;)_

_Anyway, enough explaining. Enjoy! :)_

* * *

**Vociferous Vixen's Version of a Vicarious Variant of Voracious Vermin Vexing the Vestibules of her Vivacious, yet Veracious Vacuum of a Vessel Called Her Mind**

Or simply… **An Interlude**

"Okay, okay everybody! Calm down!" Knowledge shouted out to the group of emotions gathered before her.

Rude rolled her eyes.

"I can't believe we're doing this… again."

"It's come to my attention that people are forgetting who is on whose side."

"So?" Friendship interrupted. "It means less fighting if we don't know who's on our side or not."

"True, but I've also noticed people regarding the _same_ person as being on _both_ sides as well."

"Well…"

"Just get it over with already." Brave impatiently tapped her foot, reflecting how most of the emotions felt.

"Alright, everyone who likes BB over to my left, and everyone who likes Robin, over on my right." The yellow emotion informed the group.

"Happy now?" Rude blurted out as everyone took their positions.

"We've got three unaccounted for." Knowledge pointed to the group still standing in front of her.

"Who's Robin?" "Who's BB?" Innocence and Fear asked respectively.

"Okay… so the runts don't have a side… that should be kinda obvious." Lust pointed out.

"What about you Timid?" Knowledge asked the grey emotion.

"She didn't pick a side, remember?" Friendship called out from her side of the room.

"Right." Knowledge remembered before getting out a pen and paper to write down the results. "So the list is…"

"Lust, Love, Happy, Rude, and Rage in favor of BB, and-"

"Lust could be either or…" Brave tried to correct her.

"_Well_," the spectacled emotion retorted with her all-too-common air of arrogance. "she seems to think about _BB_ more, and since _that's_ who she _chose_…"

"Just get on with it then." The green emotion huffed, not wanting to fight it.

Knowledge went back to her paper, and started scribbling once more.

"Alright. So then we have Brave, Sadness, Friendship, and me –Knowledge- in favor of Robin."

"Didn't Fri want Cyborg?" Rude questioned.

"I told you, I _hate_ that nickname!" Friendship yelled out at the orange emotion across the room. "It makes me sound like a _guy_!"

"Hey, it's not _my_ fault your name's so freaking long!"

Love sighed.

"Guys!" She grabbed Rude by the shoulder. "Cool it. She chose Robin in the end, and _that's_ where she is now."

The lilac emotion stood a little less convincingly at the side of her affiliates.

"Right." She confirmed with only a hint of conviction.

"So that leaves Timid, Fear, and Innocence clear of any affiliations." Love finished, while Knowledge scribbled it down on her paper.

"I say Timid's on BB's side…" Brave commented under her breath; albeit a little louder than she thought.

"Nuh uh… she's _totally_ a Robin fan…" Rude retorted.

"Quit it!" Love broke up the argument. "She's chosen to be on _neither_ side, so respect it, and stop giving her a hard time!"

Meanwhile, Lust turned to Happy and Rude with a devilish grin on her face.

"I wonder if we can sway the newbies to BB's side…"

Rage, who overheard the comment, snickered with a deep timbre, and sported a grin of her own.

"Yay! BB buddies!" Happy clapped excitedly.

"There will be NO such gimmicks." Knowledge scolded the girl in velvet, along with the rest of BB's side and everyone else in the room.

"Let them find out on their _own_ who they like most."

Finished with her reprimands, she turned around, and posted the piece of paper on the stone of the archway to her section of Nevermore.

"There. It's posted. If you want to change sides, come see me, and I'll change it. Otherwise, respect who's on each side."

A quick moment of silence hung in the air, as no one really knew what to do next.

Then as Happy gazed over at the green emotion across from her, she suddenly realized something, and grew a puzzled look.

"Say Brave… shouldn't you be out covering for Raven?" She scratched her head, then looked about, apparently searching for something else.

"And isn't Raven supposed to be around here somewhere?"

"Are you kidding me?" The green emotion responded. "This isn't part of the story… we're just actresses. We can be wherever we want between chapters."

"Oh." Happy looked down at her feet, taking in the new information.

"So does that mean I can go flirt with BB?"

"Knock yourself out."

"Sweet!" The pink emotion vivaciously vociferated before vacating the variegated room of voraciously vexed and vicarious vixens of her own volition.

"Wait a minute…" Brave outwardly thought to herself (and inwardly thought why there were so many 'v' words in that last sentence). "…do the guys _know_ we like them?"

Knowledge stared at her, as well as everyone else in the room.

"Good question…"

Silence resonated throughout the area as the group thought it over, and realization set in.

"I call BB!" Rude broke the silence.

"I call Robin!" Brave answered in consummation.

The rest of the girls simply yelled and squeaked as they stumbled over each other, and ran for the exit to Nevermore in groups, searching for their targets. Timid, Fear, and Innocence however, remained motionless in the center of the room.

"Maybe we should go make sure they don't get in trouble." Fear suggested to her sisters.

"I… I guess." Timid replied, and they made their way for the door as well. "If anything, I suppose it could inform you of a few things."

A short moment later, a masked figure swung in, and landed in front of them.

"What's going on?" The man asked. "I heard a bunch of screaming."

The 'Innocuous Nymphs' as Brave had recently dubbed them, looked up to greet their new visitor, and only Timid recognized the man standing before them as Robin. The other two looked on in amazement at the first boy they had ever seen –a good looking one at that- and their jaws almost dropped to the floor before a vaguely familiar feminine voice caught their attention.

"Why do I have a feeling the girls are up to no good…" Raven deadpanned as she and Beast Boy entered the room, her shoulders neatly accessorized with the changeling's arm.

"Because, you _always_ have a feeling, Rae." The changeling sighed out.

"See? There's Timid, and… two of your other emotions right there." He scratched his head, trying to remember a black and white emotion from before. "...I think."

"They're new." The dark queen responded. "Even _we_ haven't officially met yet."

"Oh."

"What's going on?" Robin inquired her.

Raven decided to direct her own curious question towards Timid to answer Robin's.

"Where are the others?"

"Looking for you two." The gray cloaked emotion responded.

The blue garbed teen recoiled with confusion, immediately relating the 'two' to be her and Beast Boy.

"Why _us_?"

"Not _you_," Timid corrected, "_them_."

"What?" Robin asked, completely dumfounded as the girl pointed to him and the green teen on the other side of Raven.

"Oh." Raven began to realize the situation.

"Robin, you may want to hide…"

"Why?"

"There they are!" A voice sounded off in the distance.

"That's why."

"What about me?" Beast Boy looked to Raven for advice on what to do next.

"They're me." She rolled her eyes at the boy's foolishness. "Besides, I'll be here to make sure they stay in line."

The green teen's eyes brightened up a bit as he visualized the situation. A grin started to creep across his face as thoughts started running through his head.

"Alright... So…"

"No Beast Boy, _only_ me." She immediately scolded him as soon as she picked up on what he was thinking.

"But what if one of them _tricks_ me, and I _think_ it's _you_?" He asked with a concerned tone, but knew deep down, he was pleading inside.

"Though it wouldn't be _that_ difficult to do…" she reflected on the high probability something like that could happen, "I suppose you'd only be cheating on me with-… _me?_" It even sounded odd to her when she said it.

Just then, the changeling took a severe blow to the stomach as Happy lunged at him, and gave him a giant bear hug.

"BB! How's my green goofball?" The pink-clad emotion exuberantly exclaimed.

He looked to Raven, and gave her a mischievous smile.

"But that _doesn't_ mean I'd be any _less_ infuriated about it." She instantly clarified. "_Understand_?"

Lust and the others finally caught up, and the velvet draped emotion was now precariously running a delicate finger down the changeling's jaw.

"Well how do _you_ do, Beastie Boo…"

As the green teen stared into the emotion's seductive eyes, he formed an idea.

"Well what if-"

"No." Raven exhorted before palming the fervid girl's face away to keep it from getting any closer to his. "_Not_ going to happen."

"Jealous much?" Lust pouted and crossed her arms as another group of girls ran behind her.

"Starfire!!!" Robin yelled as he took off running with the mob of girls after him. "A little help?! Anyone?!"

The Tameranian flew in to the room at the sound of her boyfriend's voice.

"Robin?" The Boy Wonder ran past her. "What is the matter?"

The group of girls screeched to a halt in front of the alien princess that was now standing between them and Robin.

"Not _her_…" Brave let out in disgust.

"Why are there so many Raven's?" Starfire questioned. "What _is_ this place?"

"I don't know, but they're after me." Robin looked out from behind Starfire at the motley crew before them.

"Heh…" Friendship rubbed the back of her head. "Catch ya another time?" She stated cautiously before backing away. The last thing she wanted was a confrontation with Starfire.

Sadness hung her head in dismay.

"I do not understand. Why are they after you? If they are clones of our friend, why are they not our friends as well?"

"Not clones, technically." Knowledge started to explain. "We are the personifica-"

"Spare her the explanation." Brave interrupted. "I doubt she'd understand half of what you say."

Starfire crossed her arms across her chest and huffed with an angry glare at the green emotion.

"Please continue, yellow version of Raven."

Brave rolled her eyes.

"I'll be working out in my room if you need me." She mumbled, before heading away from the group.

"As I was saying," Knowledge continued, "we are the-"

"Yo! Who started a party without telling _us_ about it?" All heads turned to the direction in which a lilac figure had been heading.

"Hey Cy." Friendship winked at the metal teen before her.

Bumblebee looked up at her boyfriend with a questioning look.

"Do you-"

"Uh… do I _know_ you?" Cyborg was still trying to remember a light purple emotion from that day long ago. "Did your cloak fade out?"

"Nope! You're thinking of L-uh… Affec-uh… the one over there." She pointed to the group surrounding Beast Boy, and subsequently, Love.

"I'm Friendship." She held out a hand, and he hesitatingly shook it. "I wasn't around until _after_ you and BB left Raven's mind."

"So… you guys are Raven's personalities?" A bemused Robin asked.

"Emotions." Knowledge corrected.

"Yeah man," Cyborg added, "this is Raven's mind. She's got a bunch of little clones runnin' about in different colors, and they're all different side's of her personality."

"Emotions." Knowledge stated again.

"Are the two words not similar?" Starfire asked, confused over the constant correction.

Knowledge straightened out her glasses.

"Actually, personality is the outward _appearance_ that one has _control_ over. We are-"

"The emotions that run amuck in my head." Raven finished. "I have no _real_ control over them, but when they get too strong, they can overtake the barriers I keep them in, and eventually take control of me."

"Like that time with Dr. Light." Robin reasoned.

"Yeah, Rage here was being a real pain." Beast Boy thumbed over his shoulder to the girl behind him. "She was all huge and nasty, and looked a lot like Trigon but then Raven totally kicked her butt, and she went back to little miss mean four eyes."

Raven glared at him, and the others gave him a worried look.

"What?" He asked in defense. "That's what happened…"

It was then that he noticed they were looking _behind_ him, rather than _at_ him.

"WANNA _REPEAT_ THAT, PAWN?"

Beast Boy turned around at the demonic voice to find a much taller, angry looking Rage with four red slits for eyes, and a cloak billowing with black tendrils.

"Eeep!" he instantly cringed, hopping back in fright.

Lust and Happy took the chance to take a stand in between them.

"Don't even think about it." Lust threatened.

"Yeah, thinking is Knowledge's job." Happy added as Rage glowered at them.

"Besides… the only one _allowed_ to hurt BB is _me_." Lust smirked wildly as she took her battle stance.

"Oh Azar…" Brave muttered, slapping her palm to her face, shaking her head in disgust.

"LUST!" Raven shouted, clearly peeved at the comment.

"Wait a minute…" Cyborg thought out loud. "Raven has an emotion named Lu-…?"

"I think now might be a good time for us to leave, Sparky." Bumblebee surmised.

"That sounds like a good idea." Robin agreed.

"Star…" he grabbed her arm.

"But what of Beast Boy?"

"Beast Boy can handle his own battles." He tugged on her arm a little more. "Let's go."

Reluctantly, Starfire followed the other Titans to the exit of Nevermore, but couldn't help looking back and yelling a farewell.

"So long many colored versions of Raven! I wish to meet you all another time!"

As they finally disappeared, Brave rolled her eyes.

"Good riddance."

Unnoticed by anyone else, Innocence had made her way up behind Rage, and started tapping her shoulder.

Rage quickly turned around, confused as to who would do such a thing.

"Why are you mad?" the cream emotion asked with her wide, innocent eyes.

"I…" Rage slowly reverted to normal. "I'm…"

"Not really mad?"

Rage was losing it in the girl's eyes. She shook her head, trying to break free and compose herself again.

"I _AM_ MAD!"

"You don't look it to me…" Love smirked.

"Well… I think we've had enough of _that_ for a day…" Raven sighed, and grabbed Beast Boy's arm. "Let's go BB."

Only Happy and Lust seemed to take notice that the two were leaving, and rushed over to stop their exit.

"Oh c'mon Rae, you _know_ you wanna let him stay here with _us_." Lust said, doing her best not to sound too pleading.

"_No_. Besides… we've got _other_ plans." Raven stated, granting a strange look from the changeling by her side.

"We do?"

"Can we come _too_?!" Happy squealed, and unlike Lust, immediately played the puppy dog card.

"Sorry Happy, maybe some other time."

"Oh c'mon Rae." Beast Boy pleaded. "How can you say _no_ to a face like _that_?"

"Like this." Raven squared her face with the pink-clad girl, and leveled their eyes. "No."

"That's just mea-"

"Nice one Raven! I knew you could be funny." Happy and Raven high fived, leaving the green teen absolutely dumbfounded.

"You were saying?" Raven smirked at the boy.

"That he wants us to come too." Lust interrupted.

"Fortunately, not everything he says is true." Raven retorted, leaving Beast Boy even more befuddled.

"I guess not." He obliged. "But I'll come back and visit another time."

Raven nodded, and the two continued their way to the door.

Lust watched as they drew closer and closer to the exit.

"I'll be waiting…"

Fin.

* * *

**Yay for random fun-ness! (Did you pick up that I've been watching "V for Vendetta"?) Hopefully it wasn't too bad for not being Beta-ed. I did sort of realize once I finished the whole thing that it sort of didn't make sense for Robin or Starfire to know about Nevermore, and subsequently enter it. Cy would know, and could've brought Bumblebee, but somehow Robin and Starfire can hear yells from Nevermore out in real life. Oh well... does it _really_ matter? **

**As you can tell, some things are slightly different for our 'actors' between chapters. I figured it'd be a nice touch. I suppose if you really, really like this sort of thing, you might convince me to do another down the road, but I think I'm gonna stick to FaN for a while since it _is_ the story.**

**Hope you enjoyed! Reviews are always nice. ;) Until chapter 8, I bid you good reading.**

**~VociferousVixenofDarkness**


	9. One Down, Two to 'Go': Part I

_**Here it is! The long overdue chapter 8! School is done, and I finally made it home, so it's about time I get back in the groove of things. Um... the spells are done in latin, and will be translated in the A/N at the end if you really have to know what they mean right away. **_

_**On with the show! Enjoy! ;)**_

* * *

Chapter 8: **Obstinately Obliging Opulent Onuses for Obdurate Onlookers **

or **One Down, Two to "Go!": Part I**

To anyone watching from afar, it would have looked like someone had tossed a green rock off the side of Titans Tower, but up close, the changeling had barely even recognized he was falling. By the time he snapped to and started yelling and flailing about, he was already halfway to the ground. The typical joy he felt in the weightlessness of falling quickly reverted to utter fear, as he had no control over it. He mentally froze up at the shock of his unexpected circumstances; by the time he thinking straight, it was obvious he wasn't going to be able to right himself and pull out of the dive in time.

'Think BB, _think_!' He yelled in his head, but all that passed through his mind were visions of Raven and the puddle of green he'd be very soon.

For some strange reason, this falling—this mental block—reminded him all too much of the day he had lost his parents. His mind had been too frozen up to save them then, just as it was frozen up trying to save himself now. The only difference this time was his so-called guardian angel kept his mind from going completely blank; thoughts of Raven –albeit not the best- still managed to float through his head. Luckily, they triggered an idea.

He shifted into the bird by her name, but in no means was it going to be as simple as pulling out of a dive, or spreading his wings. He was falling on his back, and therefore, upside-down when he shifted, making him force his wings backward unnaturally until he could get his feet towards the ground. Even still, he was coming in too fast.

Somehow, like a sub-routine, part of Robin's teachings were able to filter their way through his mind, despite the major block he was experiencing with everything else.

'Rule number one of parcore: divert the momentum laterally.' He strained the backwardly bowed wings that were slowing his fall, and angled the dive as much as he could. It didn't achieve much, but it was going to have to work. At the very last second, he morphed into a tortoise, and hid inside his shell. All he realized was that it had been triggered somehow by the memory of Raven as a bunny in Mumbo's hat. How he connected the two in his mind, he didn't care. What mattered was the pain from the rough ride he was taking was beyond bearable, so long as he hadn't become a literal grass stain from some stupid little fall.

-----

"So tell me _why_ mentioning BB's crush on Raven is taboo…"

Cyborg laughed.

"Obviously, you've never seen her mad at one of us."

Bumblebee thought about it for a moment.

"So… What? Robin can't keep secrets?"

Cyborg gazed out the window towards the city.

"Call it a… Scout's honor."

"Okay… so Robin's a tattle tale." She deciphered. "Still, I thought you said Raven already knows what's going on." Bumblebee continued pestering her beau from her seat on the couch.

"I'm _pretty_ sure she'd've figured it out. I mean… it's fairly obvious, but-"

The doors to the Common Room slid open, cutting their conversation short.

"You don't wanna take any chances." Bumblebee finished in a quiet tone only he could hear.

Cyborg nodded, still gazing out the window and managed to look down before turning to take his seat. Something caught his attention, and he noticed it was a round, green object skipping and splashing its way through the mud away from the Tower.

"B?" He asked confusedly to himself, watching as the green object hit a rock, sending it twirling up through the air.

"What, Sparky?" His girlfriend called from behind him.

"Huh? Oh." Cyborg snapped out of it, realizing the confusion. "Not you… BB. What's he doing out playing in the mud?"

He pointed out the window towards the green object, and turned to the two that had decided to join them.

"Whatd'ya do Robin?" Cy smirked, "Throw him off the roof?"

Though he'd only meant it in a joking manner, he could immediately tell neither Robin nor Starfire were in a lighthearted mood. In fact, the distance between them only grew as both of them split to go around opposite ends of the couch, never taking a glance at one another.

'They _never_ split up' Cyborg thought, still waiting for some sort of answer from Robin.

The Boy Wonder walked up to the window, but instead of giving him a reply, just grumbled and took out his communicator.

-----

The last impact before Beast Boy came to a stop had been a doozie. It had sent him twirling around in the air, and landed him on his back, upside down against a rock.

"Ow…." He grumbled, shifting back to his human form, dizzy as ever. At first, he thought the feet dangling in the air above him were those little birds he saw in all the cartoons circling above his head. That is, until the blur went away, and they came back in focus.

There was no doubt he'd be feeling the pulled muscles and bruises for the rest of the day, but despite what he was feeling, he was glad that that was all it was.

"At least I can walk this off." He muttered, still too exhausted and shocked to move. "Hopefully no one will notice."

Unfortunately, as soon as he managed to catch his breath, he lost it again when his communicator rang those nine familiar notes, and Robin's voice came crackling through.

"Beast Boy, I didn't give you time to go playing in the mud. Stop goofing around, and get your butt up here so I can talk about Red X."

"Crud." He'd been caught. Now he'd have some explaining to do.

Beast Boy flipped open his communicator to see a frustrated portrait of Robin taking up the screen.

"I'll be right up." He groaned, rolling over, and standing up. "Just make sure Cy has the front door unlocked."

"Just punch in the code little buddy!" Cyborg's voice came from off the screen, and with that, Robin shut the communicator, leaving Beast Boy staring into a blank screen.

"Great." He grumbled, making his way for the Tower's front door. "I wonder what stupid jokes they'll make up this time." He never quite let it on, but the constant jokes and put downs he received day to day for just being himself did their job to gnaw away at him, but he'd just laugh it off, or turn it around. This time, he'd have no comebacks, and no one to blame but himself.

Beast Boy made his way to the front door, and stared at the keypad before him. He never really remembered the numbers to the pass-code, but he knew it started with two twos, and resulted in the typical nine note theme they were all used to.

"Uhmmm… two, two… six… nine, six… uh, three… " The keypad rejected him with a buzz. "Nope. Let's see… two, two, six, nine, six… five, two, one, two."

He was granted with a shrill ding, and the sound of the enormous doors unlocking before they grinded open. As he was about to walk in, something caught his eye near the keypad that he didn't remember being there before.

"What's this?" He reached out to touch the small disk on the side of the control panel. It matched the light blue typical of Cyborg's tech, but it seemed… out of place. Unfortunately when he touched it, the piece fell off immediately. Apparently, his longtime curse with screwing up technical devices prevailed once more.

"Uhhh… heh." He looked around suspiciously, picking it up and trying to reattach it to no avail. After trying a few more times, he gave up and looked it over in his hand.

It was a known fact that anybody that messed up anything of Cyborg's got chewed up like bubble gum—and in his case specifically—the metal teen seemed to blow up his head with so much tech stuff he couldn't understand, that his head usually felt like it was about to pop before he was done. This time would be no different.

"I hope it's not anything important." He said warily as he tossed the stray piece behind him into a pile of rocks, hoping Cyborg wouldn't take notice until long after the fact.

Pretending like nothing had happened, he casually walked through the foyer of the tower to the elevator.

-----

Cyborg sat down on the couch next to Bumblebee, and slowly pushed the singled out box of pizza to Starfire.

"Here's your pizza, Star" He said, still curious about the entrance her and Robin had made.

"Thank you _friend_ Cyborg." She gave him an acknowledging nod, and no more. "I shall enjoy eating my meal in _your_ company." She opened the box while glaring at Robin, and grabbed a slice before reaching for the nearby bottle of mustard.

'Somethin's up.' Cy could tell from a mile away, and even Bumblebee raised a brow. Robin had done something to make her mad, which was no small feat, especially for him. However, before he could question her unhappy behavior, the Common Room doors swooshed open to reveal a slightly muddy Beast Boy.

Robin, who didn't seem like he was ever going to sit down, glared at the changeling as the boy hopped over the couch, and sat next to his buddy Cy.

"What was _that_ all about?" Robin demanded. "I tell you I need to talk about Red X, and you blow me off to jump off the roof and play in the _mud_?"

Cyborg immediately sensed that Robin was diverting his anger from whatever was going on with Star onto the boy, and tried to lighten the mood some.

"Yeah, what'dya do? Bug Raven till she threw you out the window again?"

Beast Boy lowered his head, and his ears drooped. He didn't want to talk about it.

"Actually, I kinda…" He poked his two index fingers together, thinking up something that made sure Raven wasn't involved. "…lost my balance."

Robin raised an eyebrow.

"So… why didn't you just shi-"

"Don't worry Robin, I'm sure the grass stain was just aiming to be a green skid mark on the underpants of society." Cyborg playfully nudged his friend. "That, or a human skipping stone."

It was then that Beast Boy realized the metal teen was trying to help him, and actually had to smile at the comment.

"Yeah, guess I need to practice my aim a little better, huh?" He played along.

"Please, where are these undergarments of society located? Are they large?"

It was Bumblebee's turn to crack out a laugh.

"Can they be washed?" Starfire continued.

Everyone but Starfire and Robin were now in complete hysterics.

"It's just a saying, Star." Cy managed to tell her between gasps of breath. When he finally cooled off, he noticed it was the first time Robin hadn't corrected Starfire on some earthly phrase she didn't understand.

"Oh."

"Alright, enough with the antics. Let's get down to business." Robin interrupted.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, we know. Red X." Beast Boy grabbed a slice of his veggie pizza and kicked back, lounging on the couch with his feet on the table. "Just spit it out already. Your pizza's getting cold."

"Yeah, take a look at mister serious." Bumblebee snickered, elbowing her boyfriend until Robin's eyes met hers. She instantly froze in his icy glare.

"Shutting up now."

* * *

The room was a dark grey, which kept it fairly dark but not pitch black. There was a canopy bed tucked away in the corner, whose drab grey cloth hung just a foot or so above the bed, with lots of pillows and blankets piled on top. The entire room on the whole was small and crammed, but in truth, it was meant to be. The only patch of floor not covered in furniture was a small gap that created a short path leading from the door to the bed and that's where the brown-cloaked figure decided to rise up through the floor. Underneath it's grasp, a tired Timid recognized her room, and dragged herself to her bed with the support of Sadness.

"Are you alright?" The brown emotion asked as Timid tucked herself in.

"I- I think so. I'm just… afraid for her."

Sadness acknowledged the feeling towards Raven.

"I am, too." She trailed off. "I trust Knowledge, though. If anyone can fix this, it's her."

She hesitated for a moment, thinking about the circumstances, before deciding to plop down in her chair beside the bed.

"But that's their job. I'm more worried about _you_."

Timid smiled weakly at her friend's concern. Sadness was the only one who ever saw her lips curl that way, and the fact that she had her own chair in the room—and was the only one to ever _enter_ the room besides Raven herself—showed why.

"…Did it hurt?" The brown emotion hesitantly asked.

Timid squeezed her eyes shut and nodded, remembering how painful the split had been. Silence fell over the room as Sadness desperately tried to sympathize with her friend.

"Is there anything I can do?" She asked, finally.

Timid shook her head and rolled on her side.

"I'm just… tired… really, _really_ tired." She pulled up the covers until all Sadness could see were her eyes, and the purple of her hair.

"Get some rest then. I'll go deal with the other two."

The brown cloak rose up with its owner and rustled past the boundaries of the narrow ravine it was traveling through. As it reached the door, Timid weakly called out.

"Sadness?"

"Yes?"

"Thanks." She almost whispered, and the brown emotion quietly disappeared through the archway.

She stared after the girl for a moment before curling up beneath the sheets, burrowing her way beneath the pillows as well. She was no longer in the spotlight. She was in the shadows—but _not_ the dark—of her room, tucked away in her sheltered little haven. She relaxed in its humble comfort, and her violet eyes drifted shut. Thoughts of everything else fled away and finally, she felt safe.

------

"So… I guess I'll start off with something simple…" Sadness looked around the room to find only the black cloaked emotion sitting cross legged on the floor, waiting patiently.

"Wh-what did you do to Timid?" Fear crawled backwards, trying to get up as the brown emotion walked closer.

"I… put her to sleep. Where's the white-"

"You- you monster!" Fear stumbled up to her feet, and formed a very poor defensive stance. Sadness stopped at this and gave her a questioning look.

"I beg your pardon?"

"I- I don't know w-what kind of tricks you're playing, but I won't let you hurt me too." She backed away towards the only exit she knew of: the archway to the Common Room.

"I would never hurt you." Sadness replied, still dumfounded at why this girl was so afraid of her.

She took a step forward, and the girl in black took two steps back.

"Where's the other emotion? The one in white?" She pressed, hoping that if she could convince the girl's 'sister', perhaps she would calm down.

Fear looked in the direction of the statue she had hidden behind, and as a result, the entrance to Timid's maze.

"I'm not telling you. You'll just hurt her too."

Sadness turned to the maze's entrance, and Fear made a break for it.

"Hurt? Why would I-" She turned back to where the black figure had been and realized it was now gone. She had two options: Go chase the lunatic in black, most likely scaring her even _more_, or search for the white one that had apparently gone wandering through the maze instead of waiting like she had asked.

Ultimately, she decided for the latter.

* * *

Knowledge stormed into the large green bedroom that currently held five other girls. The area around the bed was glowing, taking on a turquoise hue. The four cloaked girls had already begun the healing cycle Knowledge had taught them long ago. Well… those that had been here long ago.

'At least they remembered something…' She thought as she took a deep breath to calm herself after her fight with Lust, and walked towards the group.

Each of the four were hovering in the lotus position with their eyes closed, a blue light dancing along their hands, as they all chanted together.

"En Azarath nomen iunctus vox nos, ego tribuo vigoratus ad vos."

Happy removed her hands from Raven and the chant came once more; this time, it would be broken in two.

"En Azarath nomen iunctus vox nos," Love reached out her hands to Raven and continued alone. "Ego tribuo vigoratus ad vos!"

Again, they chanted the full line together as Love focused her power and she removed her hands once more when they finished. Next up was Friendship, who managed to carry on seamlessly. This surprised Knowledge somewhat; not because the spell was all that hard—because it wasn't—but simply because the girl had never really practiced any healing spells before. In fact, Knowledge hadn't even gotten around to teaching them to her yet.

Typically, an amateur's healing powers would pulse along with their heartbeat or if their concentration wasn't right, even falter during the process. Even more, if they concentrated _too_ hard, the colors of their base power would mix with the blue—creating a deep navy—which had the chance of doing more harm than it did good. But Friendship sat peacefully in the air, with a steady blue about her hands that even _intensified_ when she focused; as only a pro could do.

Unfortunately, when the time came around for Rude to do her part, the practice came to an end.

"Finally decided to join us?" She asked grudgingly, looking over her shoulder at the yellow emotion behind her. "Last time I checked, four isn't even _half_ of Raven's emotions."

Friendship was the last to break from the chant and come back to reality.

"How did you… Were you not focusing on healing Raven?" The lilac emotion fumed at Rude's apparent lack of concern.

"Of course I was." She spat back. "But it's kinda hard to keep that focus when you've got someone who smells like rotten leather and wet pages standing at your back."

"I do no-" Knowledge went to rebut.

"I'm surprised you can even _smell_ beyond your _own_ rotten stench!" Happy yelled out, and instantly burst out laughing at her own joke. Even Love let out a chuckle.

"He-!"

"Ah ah ahhh…" Knowledge stopped her. "_You_ dished it out, so it's only _fair_ if you can take it back."

Rude grumbled and crossed her arms, while untangling her legs from the lotus position to stand on firm ground.

"So how's she doing?" Knowledge asked. It was apparent to her that Raven wouldn't likely be entering a healing trance on her own this time. She had far too little power to start one even _before_ she got knocked out.

"I'm pretty sure we've stopped all the bleeding." Love responded.

"Yeah, but she's still got some fractures and broken bones. Not to mention all the bruises and sprained muscles." Friendship added.

"I don't know about _you_ guys, but I don't really _care_ about the minor stuff. I'm already feeling the pain get to me." Rude interjected before taking a seat in a nearby lounge chair. "Besides, most of it she did to herself fighting Red X. Why should _we_ have to heal her for _that_?"

Knowledge didn't say a word. She knew the tradeoff of healing someone else; especially when it was major. Between the empathy and the pain absorbed through the actual process, it could get pretty rough, even more so in prolonged sessions. There was a reason why you healed intermittently with a large group of people.

She even noticed Happy looked a little… less chipper than usual.

"I wish Brave and the others were here." The pink-clad emotion let out, deciding to sit on the side of the bed near Raven's feet.

"You know, and that's _another_ thing that bugs me." Rude argued. "You all just let her _waltz_ her way out of here like it was _nothing_. Not only is it a _bad_ idea for her to be out there in the real world, but who's to say she'll even come _back_?"

The others in the room directed their gazes to the orange emotion. She had a point. Brave didn't need them for advice or to control her emotions; she _was_ an emotion. Heck, she was in complete control now with Raven locked away in Nevermore and it was in no way different from what Rage had always aimed to do from day one.

* * *

A pair of blue boots kicked back and forth as their owner watched them in deep thought, uncomfortably sitting on the side of a bed that wasn't hers. Brave knew she was going to be in deep shit with Raven for leaving Nevermore and also knew just how much _more_ she'd be in if she managed to mess things up. To some extent, she figured she really had nothing else to lose if she carried out her plan, but for some reason, it just wasn't sinking in.

'It's one thing to do _this_,' She referred to her surroundings, 'But if I start messing around, and show her friends she can feel, I'm not so sure she wouldn't tie me up and let me be Rage's little plaything.' She instantly shuddered at the thought and—of all people—Brave was not the shuddering type.

She thought about it a little more and then collected herself.

"Awww, the hell with it." She murmured, while standing up. "If she doesn't start showing more emotions, I might as well be in the same situation. Besides, there's always the possibility she _could_ thank me…" She trailed off, thinking.

A moment later, the faint sound of laughter wafted through the walls and managed to break her reverie.

'Sounds like _they're_ all having fun.' She glared at the door as if it was purposely imprisoning her in this room. To some extent, it was, between what she had told Robin and her own fears of meeting the Titans all at once. However, that was her fault. Not that of the piece of cold metal standing before her.

Briefly, her mind drifted back to Raven at the thought of something cold. She stood still, playing over what had happened back in Nevermore.

'It feels like I just… walked out on her.' She reminisced.

'Well… I _did_ walk out on her…' She lowered her head and began pacing the room. 'But… I did it to _help_. Right? _This_ is… _helping_ her.' She tried convincing herself, but it wasn't working.

'Me, sitting here… all alone… doing nothing…' She let out a heavy sigh, and flopped back down on the bed, smashing her face into a fluffy pillow in the process.

"This is such a stupid idea." She mumbled into the pillow.

'But… she can't just _disappear_. If anything happens and I'm not here, they'd probably think someone _kidnapped_ her.'

An aggravated and guttural growl filled the room as Brave mentally punished herself for not coming up with a better way to help Raven out.

"I _hate_ Nevermore."

* * *

Fear made her way through many of the archways surrounding what she figured was a common room of sorts, desperately searching for the only person she knew she could trust right now. That yellow one. She vaguely noticed every room she entered had a different color to it, and when she came across a yellow one, she knew it had to be that of the person she was looking for. In it, there were bookshelves among bookshelves of books that towered so high they left most of the room in shadow. She wondered how anyone was not only able to _read_ all these books, but _reach_ the ones sitting on the higher shelves. Each shelf was easily two stories high and there was no indication of a ladder or anything to get them down.

'Then again…' she thought, 'If one of these clones of me could disappear through the floor, there's a possibility there's another way to get them down.'

"Hello?" She called out, moving swiftly from one corridor to another, and eventually found that not only was there an echo, but it took forever to come back. This place was HUGE.

"Hello… Anybody here?" She called out again, as she came to a corner of the bookshelves lining the perimeter of the room.

When she looked down the last corridor, she found a yellow lazy chair a short ways away. Accompanying it was an old wooden side table whose only purpose seemed to be that of holding the decorative oil lamp atop it. Across from the seat, an alcove was present in the never-ending bookshelf, complete with a waterfall of solid wax lining the walls beneath unlit candles. Above it, numerous vials of what she figured were ingredients ruled the shelves, and as her gaze fell to the floor, she found that it all encompassed a distinct circle that had been marked into the dirt.

"Um… Yellow- girl?" She called down the aisle, for lack of a better name before turning back to check the other half of the room. Unfortunately, her search there was just as unsuccessful. It was becoming quite apparent that if the girl hadn't answered by now—no matter how long the corridors—she probably wouldn't be here.

Disheartened, the black cloaked figure skulked back out to the common room, finally taking notice that the one in brown hadn't been following her. However, she was still intent on finding the girl in yellow and she took her best guess at which of the remaining doors would have someone behind them. One seemed to call out to her in the back of her mind and she realized that—other than going with her gut feeling—the small pile of rock before it would have probably rendered it the _last_ door to look through. She walked over to it and stepped though the archway, taking a quick glance around the room. What she found was that it was filled mostly with objects of a rich green color, and—as luck would have it—no one seemed to be here, either. However, as she turned back to the door to leave, she heard a rustling of paper and it immediately grabbed her attention, halting her in her tracks.

Unsure of who or where the noise had come from, she furtively snuck across the room to the only object that looked like it could conceal a person from view: A large, green chair. However, as soon as she came up behind the seat, her observation turned out to be false; not _only _did she see a pair of burgundy boots dangling off the side of the chair, but she _also _caught sight of a second person lying on a bench.

'Is that girl… tied u-?'

"What? Did you come back for _more_?" Lust teasingly called out, hearing the footsteps approaching from behind her. This of course, was returned with a startled Fear squeaking out in fright.

"Hey… you're not-" Lust sat up in her chair, still unable to see who it was.

"Bad place! Bad place!" Fear screamed out as she scrambled for the door.

"Waaait up." Lust lazily replied, as she stood up and turned to watch the black shadow race across the room.

Suddenly, it snapped in her mind who it was.

"Hey! Come back here!" She yelled, but realized it wasn't going to stop the other emotion from fleeing the room.

Rolling her eyes, she brought her hand up.

Fear looked back for a second—hoping that this new mistress wasn't hot on her tail—and in doing so, she didn't happen to see the black wall glide up before her, effectively blocking her exit. When she turned back around, she was personally greeted with a black haze as she slammed face-first into the obsidian surface.

Lust watched rather amusingly as the girl slammed into her barrier, and fell to the floor.

"Oops…" She giggled to herself. "Did _I_ do that?"

She slowly sauntered up to the girl who was still rubbing her head on the floor.

"Sorry hun." She smiled, and bent over.

With one hand still holding her book, Lust extended her other to help the emotion up, but instead of a hand, she received a horror-stricken look.

"Y-yo-you put her to sleep!" Fear shakily pointed in the direction of Rage.

Lust looked over her shoulder at the red emotion still sleeping on the makeshift bed.

"Well, not technically… but yeah." She playfully remarked with a smile.

"Murderer!" Fear scampered up and ran towards the red emotion, hoping she might have a chance to save her.

"Wha-?" Lust froze in puzzlement as a streak of black passed her, almost reaching Rage by the time she finally turned around.

"Hey! Get away from her!"

"Make me!"

In a last ditch effort, the black emotion dove for Rage, but felt her body come to a stop mid-air, as a layer of black swam over her body, as if her cloak had become a bodysuit, engulfing it entirely except for her head.

Next thing she knew, she was halfway across the room against her own freewill, eye to eye with this slave-keeper of sorts. As the perturbed emotion began to speak, anger mixed in with her saucy tone, and served to make it that much edgier and spicy.

"Okay." Lust sighed out as she finally got hold of the situation. "_Obviously_ you're confused, and I'd _love_ to clear it up, but—_so help me Azar_—the _last_ thing I'll let you do is wake _her_ up!" Her eyes flamed up to a much warmer purple as they squeezed into needlelike slits.

_"Now..."_ She brought the black emotion closer to her face. "_What_ is your name, and _why_ are you h-_Ow_!" All of those lessons with Brave and she still managed to forget the basic rule of combat: Don't bring your opponent close enough to attack.

Fear had seen her chance and taken it. Since she was stuck in the other girl's grasp, she did the only thing she _could_ do; headbutt her opponent. Immediately, the black containing her body dissolved, and she dropped to the floor as Lust stumbled backwards, rubbing her head. The moment her feet made contact with the ground, she took off and ran for the nearby archway once more.

* * *

Silence still reigned in Brave's bedroom as the emotions continued to stare at Rude, thinking over what the girl in question's motives for leaving really were.

"You forget." Knowledge finally cut the silence hanging in the room. "Part of Brave is _loyalty_. She could _never _turn her back on us, or Raven for that matter…"

"Or _could_ she?" Rude finished her companion's uneasy statement. "You _know _how she gets when it comes to her beliefs. Who's to say she won't _stay_ out there until she makes sure she gets her way with something?"

A quick moment passed before the opposing sides of Love and Knowledge took their gazes from Rude, and glanced at each other.

"Robin…" They both let out, realizing the hand might ultimately be forced by Brave rather than chosen by Raven.

Friendship merely remained placid in her levitating position near Raven's head, unwavering at the possibility of her chosen outcome coming true.

"Ugh!!" Happy let out in a disgruntled tone. The bickering and fighting between everyone, she could take. Rage being a bitch, she could take. Raven falling in _battle_, she could take. Even the pain from _healing_ Raven, she could take. But _all_ of that compounded with the fact that BB might get pushed aside for Robin, she just _couldn't_ take. Her everlasting smile reversed its polarity, and she started to fall backwards on the bed in defeat, forgetting Raven's legs were still there.

Midway through her fall, a confused black figure came running and screaming through the door.

"AHHHHHHHH!!!!!" Immediately, she recognized the one in yellow, and changed her course, bolting towards Knowledge with a look of relief on her face that someone was actually in the room. "Crazy red la-!"

Before she finished, Happy made her landing—quite a hard one at that—which resulted in an utterly blood-curdling scream from Raven who awoke with a jump, and lurched up in bed.

"AAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!" Fear joined in sync, running back for the door as Lust entered the doorway.

"Where's that little bra- ahhhh!!" She covered her ears at the torturous noise along with the others.

Happy did her best to get off Raven without using the hands she had clamped tight over her ears. Once she did, the screaming quickly subsided and Fear dove back to Knowledge at the sight of Lust, hiding within the yellow cloak.

"Raven!" The crowd seemed to yell all at once now that they could hear again.

"Are you okay?" Friendship added on, completing the general inquiry.

Raven grunted and moaned, writhing about in pain and discomfort while her face became a basketful of displeasing wrinkles.

"Do-ughhh-z it l-ooooghh-k like ignt?!" She tried to groan through the excruciating pain. Her legs were on fire, her chest was rapidly rising and falling _despite _her efforts to keep it still, and each vein in her body felt like it was pumping needlesrather than blood. She didn't daremove a muscle, though her conscience forcibly decided otherwise, only adding to the displeasing torture she was in.

Everyone just stared at her in shock; a massive wave of pain taking over every single emotion's sense of empathy as they stood terror-stricken and completely helpless to soothe her.

"OUT!" Knowledge yelled, realizing what needed to be done. "Everyone. OUT." She pointed to the door, receiving many strange looks as she did.

"Now." She demanded with a deep growl.

All that was heard were the groans and gasps of breath from Raven as the bed sheets rustled about beneath her. All but Fear took heed and left without another word. Lifting her cloak up, Knowledge glared down at the emotion clinging to her leg.

"I-I d-don't wanna go. I'm afraid." She squeezed the yellow emotion's leg even tighter.

Knowledge sighed, and dragged her leg to the side of the bed. She wasn't about to waste time arguing with Fear.

"Fine. Then I want you to _close_ your eyes and cover your ears 'til I say so. Got it?" Fear sheepishly nodded, and did as she was told.

As soon as the emotion complied, Knowledge covered her again with her cloak and turned her attention to Raven.

"Raven." Knowledge cautiously addressed the teen suffering on the bed before her. "I know how much you're going to hate it, but there's _really _no other choice." Despite the apparent lack of attention the girl seemed to be giving her, she decided to continue. "We have no meds, so if you want this pain to stop…" She waited for Raven to finish a contraction that left her groaning in sharp pain. "…I'm going to have to use… _dark_ magic."

The girl suddenly snapped her head to the side and glared at Knowledge, her hard, glassy eyes almost in tears from the pain. There was a distinct anger of betrayal within them, but as she stared up at Knowledge, it slowly started to sink in that there really _was_ no other choice. She held steady as tears of pain began wetting her cheeks; a clear sign she was already beginning to crack. Raven was strong-willed and determined, but even so, this was just too much for her to handle on her own.

Knowledge looked on, waiting for an answer as the seconds ticked by in her head. It was hard enough to watch alone, but the attack on her _own_ mind through the empathic side of her powers as the two locked eyes made the scene all the more excruciating. A full minute went by and she almost wanted to just reach out and strangle Raven for being so stubborn, before carrying out the spell anyway. However, she was never one to go making decisions for the girl, and she _certainly_ wasn't about to start now.

A few more seconds passed and the convulsing started to settle down. Raven was finally giving in. Slowly, her eyes began to soften behind her tears; her selfishness to stop the pain finally begining to outweigh her strict morals against ever using dark magic again. She squeezed her eyes shut in defeat, wringing them dry of every last speck of water, and slowly nodded.

Knowledge brought her hands up to Raven's forehead, and silently whispered before preparing for the spell.

"I'm sorry Raven. I wish there was another way…"

All of the determination in Raven's eyes was now completely gone. Knowledge could feel her crumbling under the pain, and took one last look down at the now-pleading eyes before her hands started to glow and she found her center.

"_Voco_ vis _glacio_…" She started out slowly, "_vestri_ mens _quod_…" Her hands grew cold, and she could feel the spell starting to take over. "Loco is _dormio_… pro melior _bonum_!"

True, the very last part wasn't exactly part of the original spell—in fact, only the truly disturbed ever added it on with conviction—but she used it to offset the uneasiness of having to use dark magic. Besides, the spell had already been uttered and started to take effect; nothing she could say or do would be able to stop it until it was finished.

Suddenly, she felt a shrill chill surround her ajna chakra and like a lethal icicle, it drove its way through her mind, back to her spinal cord. From there, it trickled down between her shoulder blades, forcing her to fight the nagging urge to shiver in order to keep the energy directed at Raven's forehead. Goosebumps plagued her body as the chill wrapped itself around her arms and made its way to her fingertips. Then, she felt it. Raven finally relaxed.

But that wasn't _all _she felt.

* * *

**Spells: En Azarath nomen, iunctus vox nos- ego tribuo vigoratus ad vos! =** In Azarath's name, united we cry - I give (out) health to you!

**Voco vis glacio... vestri mens quod... loco is dormio- pro melior bonum! = **I summon the force to freeze... your mind and... put it to sleep- for the greater good.

_**Well... there isn't much I have to say. Part II is next! **_

_**You can either keep reading, or let me know what you think so far at this point in time! **_**;)**

_**~VociferousVixenofDarkness**_


	10. One Down, Two to 'Go': Part II

Chapter 8: **Co-Conspirators Conforming to Counter Corruption / Cohorts Coalescing to Cease Corruption**

or **One Down, Two to "Go!": Part II**

"I wish there was another way I could help…" Brave mumbled through the pillow that was now cradling her face in warmth from her own breath.

Slowly, she sat up again on the bed, her eyes bearing down on the door leading out to the hall. An urgent thought crossed her mind and she instantly appointed herself a new, top priority.

'If Raven wakes up before they finish healing her…' She jumped up from the bed in alarm, and swiftly made her way for the door. '…she's going to be in a _lot_ of pain.'

As she reached the door, she leaned an ear against it and listened for anyone in the hallway, before quietly sliding it open. As she stepped out into the hallway, she quickly looked around, trying to orient herself, and focused.

Her feet gently levitated off the ground and she floated on down the hall so as not to make footsteps, and headed in the direction she thought was right. After all, seeing places through Raven's eyes was completely different than experiencing them firsthand. Luckily, most of the doors were labeled, and she soon found the one labeled 'STAIRS'. She quietly made her way down one level, and opened the door; immediately knowing she was in the right place. The hall took on the smell of disinfectants and sterile instruments, and as she walked down it and opened the door to the Medical Bay of the tower, it only became stronger. This was the only level that never had a mess in it, and even _she _knew each of the Titans made sure it stayed that way.

Brave hurriedly looked around the room, vaguely remembering cabinets and drawers full of pills, but nothing had ever been really explained to Raven. Cyborg took care of everything and Raven almost never needed healing. Any time she had been in here, she was either a spectator or in a trance.

"Meds, meds, meds… where are the painkillers?" She muttered under her breath as she began searching through all the possible places that could hold some sort of medication.

"Blankets…. Gowns… Cotton balls… " She carried her search from the cabinets and drawers down below to those up above.

"Aha!" She opened a cabinet full of pills, bottles, and syringes.

Running a finger along the labels on the bottles filling the cabinet, she started to read them off.

"Icy.. pro- whatever the hell, Io-dine… Glu-tar-al-dehyde… why aren't these in _English_?" She aggravatingly spat.

Just then, a poster on the wall grabbed her attention. On it, was a layout of the cabinets, apparently displaying different colors for different types of drugs. Brave gave it a once over and immediately moved to a cabinet marked red for painkillers on the layout sheet.

"Figures." She mumbled. "With someone like Beast Boy around, there's gotta be instructions laying around that even a _monkey_ can understand."

She opened the cabinet before her, and started taking one of each bottle, and placing them in her hood.

'I hope Knowledge knows how much she'll need and what all these do.' She told herself as the hood slowly started to fill up, pulling her cloak back. With a few extra bottles in her hand, she quickly grabbed a handful of syringes just in case, and headed for the door.

* * *

"Huh." Beast Boy huffed as he held a hand up to his chin, thinking. "So… You have an evil twin, who does evil, and you're a good guy who does good. Your evil twin gets in trouble with the bad guys and then purposely fights us—the good guys—in hopes that he'll be captured so he can be protected from the bad guys, or turn good, and defeat the evil that he was a part of in the first place that is simultaneously after us, and then probably go back to doing evil again?" He looked up at Robin who had crossed his arms after he had finished explaining the deal with Red X and the Blue Flame. "If my head ever stops spinning, I think I'd say your alter ego is either really stupid or has lost his marbles."

"Yeah man, why should we help him, even if it helps us?" Cyborg cut in.

"_Because_." Robin turned around to look out the window. "Believe it or not, I _do_ sort of trust him. He's saved me more than once… If he's even _half _right about this new… army or whatever it is in Jump that's coming for us, we could use all the help we can get."

"So you're just going to let him go? Man, what are you on? How do you know he's not going to just come up and backstab us from behind lik-…" Even Bumblebee caught the tension that suffocated the room before Cy caught himself. She was curious as to why, but immediately knew it was something no one wanted to talk about.

"Perhaps… this Red X deserves a second chance." Starfire decided to break the tension still lingering in the air. "Though it is true he attacked us to steal the suit, he has never confronted us, or been a major threat. We never gave him a chance and the only reason he fought today was because _we _attacked _him_."

"I guess Star's right." BB scratched his head, still trying to comprehend all that was happening. "He _did _sorta help save our butts with Dr. Chang and that stupid race for Robin's '_prized'_ possession." Everyone but Robin and Bumblebee rolled their eyes at the mention of the briefcase. "And he totally could have had us if he wanted today, but he didn't."

"Uh… aren't you _forgetting _something?" Bumblebee leaned over to stare at him. "_I_ saved your butts. He _would_ have had you if I wasn't here."

"Oh yeah? Well…" The changeling was at a loss for a comeback. She _had_ saved their butts. "That's still two for three, so I'm still with Star."

"Dudes, I don't care _what_ you think." Cy added in. "Why don't we just throw his butt in jail, keep the belt, lock it away—_safer_ this time—and call it a day? Heck, if you _really_ want to risk it an' all and be his friend, I _suppose_ we could keep him here, but I ain't trustin' some vigilante that just managed to take us all down-"

"_Ahem_"

"-all but _Bee_ here, down, and givin' him back that belt of his!"

"Bumblebee," Robin turned back to look at his teammates. "I think it goes without saying that I'd like you to stay here to help out."

"Like she was really going to leave anyway..." Beast Boy muttered under his breath.

Bumblebee reached across Cyborg's lap and slapped Beast Boy in the gut at the comment.

"Certainly." She happily replied to Robin. "Should I call my team as well?"

"Not yet. Let them keep tabs on Steel City for now. We don't quite know how _much_ trouble, if _any_ we're in for right now."

"So are we to do the recruiting of the Red X or not?" Starfire piped up, still curious over the decision; although it was addressed more to the others than it was to Robin.

"We are _not_ recruiting him." Robin spat. "We would accept him as an ally for the time being—until this is over—and then turn him in." Robin gritted through his teeth. "He's _still _a criminal."

Beast Boy couldn't help but snicker at Robin's accusations.

"So what? The guy probably just steals candy bars or something in his spare time. He just wanted to look cool doing it with some fancy 'powers' and a mask."

Cyborg turned to and loomed over the green boy sitting at his side.

"_Aaannd_ he got involved with some major villain by stealing a _Crunch_ bar for him, right?" He questioned the changeling sarcastically.

"More like… a _Klondike_ Bar!" Beast Boy fell to his side laughing and Cyborg fought to stifle a laugh. "Haha you know? What would you do-ooh-oo-…ahahahaha!"

"Grow up Beast Boy!" Robin yelled, his voice full of anger. "You know… I'm beginning to think that perhaps Red X would be a _better_ Titan than _you_!" Everyone on the couch froze. "Hell, he may not follow my orders—though neither do you sometimes—but at least he'd _listen_ instead of making-"

"Woah, woah, woah." Bumblebee jumped up from her seat to stop the Boy Wonder from encroaching on Beast Boy any more. "Chill, Robin. That's not going to hel-"

"I know it isn't. It never _does_." He angrily muttered.

Beast Boy had stopped his laughing, and straightened in his seat, now hanging his head in shame.

"So… I guess we're helping him out. Aren't we..." He bashfully tried to change the subject.

Robin took a deep breath.

"It's really up to you guys I guess. If you can't trust working with him… we can always leave him in the interrogation room until this is over."

"I guess we take a vote?" Bumblebee interpreted. "Majority rules."

"I'm still not exactly sure what 'this' _is_, but I guess I'm in." The changeling muttered.

"I too, am the 'in' for fighting with Red X" Starfire responded, averting her eyes from Robin.

"Well Bee, what's it gonna be?" Cyborg stared down his girlfriend. "You already know _my _opinion, and the closest vote is only going to be a tie if you _and _Raven decide to be on my side."

Bumblebee raised her eyebrow at the challenge, and placed her hand on her hip.

"From what it sounds like, your 'villain' is just misinformed. He could have been wreaking havoc all over Jump with that suit, but yet, he hasn't. Clearly, he has _some_ sense of control and if he's saved your butt at least once, and your own leader thinks it's a good idea to team up with him, then I think you'd just be creating excuses to argue over and being that typical stubborn boy I fell in love with _not_ to allow it."

"Ah-_hemm_…" Starfire cleared her throat at the word love, making sure that everyone in the room took notice of it.

"What?" The yellow and black teen asked.

"It's nothing." Robin grudgingly answered on Starfire's behalf. "So, are one of you in? Or should I go wake Raven?"

"I really don't have much of a choice." Cy muttered. "I'm in, but that _doesn't_ mean I like it."

"Good, cuz I'm in too." Bee added.

"Shall we go inform him of our decision?" Starfire asked.

"I suppose we should." Robin sighed. "I still have a few questions to ask him, and I'm sure most of the answers are what you'd like to hear as well."

"Well… might as well get this over with." Cy grumbled and stood up.

Star and Beast Boy followed suit, and all of them trailed behind Robin as he made his way for the doors.

Beast Boy let out a small laugh.

"I sure hope Raven doesn't mind us making decisions behind her back." He smirked. "'Cuz if she does…"

* * *

"We're so screwed." Rude worriedly stated to the rest of the emotions now milling about Brave's common room.

"I wouldn't worry too much; it sounds like miss smarty pants knew _something _she could do to help Raven." Lust crossed her arms, and leaned on one leg. "I just don't understand why she let that black _runt_ stay in there when she forced the rest of _us_ out."

"Why all the hostility?" Love asked. "You don't even know her yet."

"_Because_." Lust growled. "If the lump on my forehead isn't going to be enough for you, she almost jumped Red Riding Hood over there, and woke her up on me." She nodded in the direction of Rage who was still out cold behind her.

"Well, why is she running around on her own?" Friendship added in, finally settling to the floor. "Shouldn't someone be looking after her and that _other_ new one?"

The lilac emotion quickly decided that standing wasn't as good an idea as she originally thought, and slowly made her way to the green high backed chair in the room. Lust watched her as she headed towards it, and noticed the limp she carried.

"I think that's what Timid or Sadness are supposed to be doing…" She dazedly replied before arriving to her question at hand. "What happened to _you_?"

"Ha! You mean you didn't see it?" Rude replied. "She _totally_ got owned by Rage."

"Just like someone _else_ we know?" Happy attempted to lighten the mood, but it was hard. Things seemed to keep piling up instead of thinning out as she hoped.

"I doubt her '_ownage'_ was as humiliating as yours though." Love added on to Happy's retort.

"You know what? Fine. If you all feel like _ganging_ up on me, I'm going to my room." Rude grunted. "I had _no_ part in what happened, and I think I've _more_ than filled my quota for helping. Since no one _else_ seems to want to help, and no one wants to _listen_ to me, I don't see any _point_ in sticking around." She headed for the door and no one made a move to stop her. "I sure as _hell_ don't want to be here when Raven calms down enough to start going ballistic on your asses over everything that's going on." The orange emotion paused at the archway to glance back at the others. "Just let me know if I need to sweep up any dropped heads." With that, she vanished into the portal before her.

Lust blinked once after the orange emotion's little rant ended, before turning back to the lilac one sitting in the chair before her.

"So why don't you just _heal_ your leg?"

"_Because_." Friendship spat out as she massaged the leg. "_I_ can deal with it. I'm not about to just _waste_ my energy when Raven's sitting in the other room needing all the help she can get."

Happy plopped down in a green bean bag chair and let out a sigh, trying to think over all that was going down, and find something good in it.

"That's very noble of you, dear," Love took a look at the injured leg. "But-"

"I _said_ I can _handle_ it." Friendship practically growled at her sister, making the purple emotion visibly recoil at her words.

"You _do_ know that the battle scar thing only works for _guys_, right?" Lust teased, and was instantly rewarded with a sinister glare.

"_Why_ is it that _despite_ the very fact that _Raven_—the only _reason_ you even _exist_—is in great pain in suffering not _feet_ away, you _still_ manage to pretend like nothing's _wrong_?!"

Lust's eyes opened wide at the aberrant animosity teeming from her sister.

"But Knowledge is working on it right no-" Love tried to calm the infuriated lilac emotion down.

"_So_?" Friendship cut her off. "It doesn't _matter_. She _still_ should've been in there with us, _helping_ instead of just _relaxing_ out here because she doesn't feel like she gets enough '_love'_ from Raven." She cringed as she stood up again, letting her anger override the pain in doing so to make her point. She shifted her weight and grabbed the back of the chair, steadying herself into a more comfortable position.

"Is it just _me_, or am _I _the only one who is actually _grateful_ for her? I mean, Brave _runs_ off, Sad goes and _hides_, Knowledge decides to run errands instead, Rude's only _half-assing_ her way because she doesn't want to get yelled at for _not_ doing anything, and _Timid_… has a valid excuse I guess, but _still_." She took a deep breath and narrowed her eyes on Lust. "_No_ sister of _mine_ would be so-…" She stumbled over her own anger to find the right word "…_cold hearted_ not to jump at the chance to help someone as close to them as _Raven_."

At this, Lust's countenance darkened emphatically and she took a step forward that dared the lilac cloaked emotion to continue.

Happy sighed out heavily.

'Here we go again…' She moaned inwardly. Not even a minute alone, and they were already fighting…again.

"Well maybe you haven't _noticed_, but she doesn't exactly get along with m-"

"She was out cold! What would it have matter-?"

"Well, I was out here keeping an eye on Rage! _Someone_ had to! I figured-"

"A blind _monkey_ could do that job! You could've let Timid or Sad or even one of those new _simple_to-"

"Like _they'd_ be able to handle her!"

"And _you_ could? When's the last time you put that _gutter_ of a book down and actually practiced _fighting_ with your powers?"

"A _while_. But, I don't see the _point_ when we're stuck in _here_ all the time. Ms. Vicious isn't _that_ tough."

"You probably wouldn't stand a _chance_ against her even _with_ her hands tied behind her back!"

"Wanna _bet_? With some _basic_ defenses, she'd wear out as fast as your-"

"Don't _even_-"

"Are you two _done_?" Love aggravatingly let out. If there was something more repulsive than two emotions that were supposed to be filled with love arguing with each other, she couldn't come to think of it.

"Oh, it's _been_ done for a _looong_ time. Little miss 'Robby-wobby lover' here just won't put aside the fact that there are more _prudent_ efforts that take precedence over her obsession with finding every last _ounce_ of energy to get something _she_ wants accomplished before _thinking_ things through."

"You call _fantasizing_ about BB twenty four seven an effort?"

"It would be for _you_, since you don't actually-"

"Sorry to interrupt the love squad and all, but YOU'RE GIVING ME A HEADACHE!" Happy finally yelled, clearly losing the character of her name with every passing second.

Love rolled her eyes at the pink emotion.

"Great. More yelling. That'll certainly help." She muttered sarcastically before turning her head to the other two stubborn emotions who were now caught in a sardonic stare down. "She's right though, you're giving me one too."

Friendship quickly broke her stare to furrow her brow and rub her temples.

"Me too." She moaned.

Suddenly, everyone snapped their gaze to Rage as she started mumbling in her sleep.

"Hate… Cold. Must burn… Flames…"

"Apparently it's everybody." Lust said as she rubbed the cold spot on her forehead like the rest. "What the heck is…"

A deep chill quickly came over all of them, causing Happy to start chattering her teeth, and Friendship to shiver, crumbling to her feet so she could use her supporting hand to try and rub the cold out.

Rage abruptly awoke, rolling off her makeshift bed, and onto the floor with her hands still tied behind her back.

"WHAT MALIGNING FOOL-… WHAT'S THIS ALGIDITY?"

"Knowledge!..." Love worriedly cried out, running for the door. A shivering Lust hesitatingly followed shortly after, realizing Rage was more confused by the current situation than she was angry at them for tying her up.

---------------

The bright yellow cloak that hung beside Brave's bed was violently shaking in response to the two girls beneath it.

Knowledge found herself desperately trying to break her hands free from the spell's grasp. Once she noticed the horrible mistake she had made, she found it to be too late. The spell quite literally was doing what it was meant to, which would have been fine, had _Knowledge_ not been the one to actually cast it.

The translation of the spell roughed out to freezing the mind in order to put one to sleep, but the one slight detail she hadn't thought of, was that _Nevermore_ was part of Raven's mind. In essence, everything within was now in the process of being frozen and she couldn't do anything to stop it.

As the caster in particular, her body was freezing twice as fast—due to not only the effect of the spell—but the chill that usually accompanies the caster themselves. She could already feel the numbness in her extremities, and her body was becoming stiffer than even the spell itself typically enforced. In an effort to save herself –and Nevermore for that matter- she tried kicking Fear from her leg and yelling out to her, but the black lump hanging on to her leg was being stubborn. With her hands over her ears, and her eyes shut tight, Fear wasn't taking a hint of anything, and with Knowledge's hands stuck in one position, the situation was turning grim. Sheets of ice began forming in the pit of the yellow emotion's stomach, both from guilt and fear as she helplessly watched the spell unwillingly pull the power from within her and penetrate Raven's mind to create this frozen hell.

Love finally managed to stumble into the room, and immediately took notice of the dramatic drop in temperature accompanying it.

"Kn-nun-nun-owl-le-ledge?" She chattered as she cautiously walked toward the emotion, rubbing her arms beneath her tightly wrapped cloak to keep warm.

Knowledge tried to cry out, but soon found that in the short time since she had given up yelling at Fear, her vocal chords had frozen up. That, or her fear had completely rendered her devoid of any body functions besides breathing.

"Ohhh s_hit_." Lust tepidly renounced as she entered the frigid room. At the sight of the unresponsive emotion before them, thoughts of the first fight she witnessed Raven in came pouring back to her. It was no doubt dark magic, and Knowledge had no control.

"Knowl-?" Love rested a hand on the yellow emotion's shoulder, and instantly withdrew it, when she found it to be ice cold.

"Take her down!" Lust yelled, and ran towards the two, remembering how Beast Boy had stopped Raven before.

"Wha-?" Love watched as Lust lunged at Knowledge's midsection, and tackled her to the ground, revealing a shivering Fear in their wake.

The force of the impact was enough to disrupt the spell, and the ice that had slowly started trickling down their spines began retreating, leaving a frigid trail in its path.

"Was-s that r-really necess-ssary?" Love looked down at the two emotions now lying on the floor.

Realizing the yellow cloak had left her, Fear opened her eyes and looked up to find the two other girls in the room, and took her hands away from her ears. As she continued to shiver, she looked over at the evil maroon one, now realizing she had done something to her friend.

"W-wh-what's g-going on?" She asked tepidly.

Lust got up to a knee, and looked the girl right in the eyes.

"Not now, kid. _Look_, I _know_ we got off on the wrong foot, but Knowledge needs help now. It seems we _all_ do, so just bear with me…" She looked up to Love, and gave her a nod. "Love, I need you to get the others to round up a bunch of blankets, and get yourselves warmed up _slowly_."

The violet emotion nodded, and took a step before hesitating to take another.

"What about Raven?"

The velvet-clad emotion stood up, and pulled the covers over the somber girl lying on the bed.

"Whatever Knowledge did has her knocked out pretty good right now. Let's just hope it stays that way for a while."

Love simply nodded and swiftly left the room, leaving Lust and Fear to deal with the motionless yellow popsicle that used to be Knowledge.

"As for _you_, my dear…" Lust gently rested a hand on the black emotion's shoulder, "I presume your name is- Fear?"

"Y-yes."

"Well, before you go running off again to Azar-_knows_-where, I want you to know that I–the name's _Lust_ by the way—would never _hurt_ anyone unless they gave me just cause."

Seeing the girl still gazing up at her with an unnerved look in her eye, Lust tried to explain.

"You've come at a very… complex time, and a lot of what's going on doesn't even make sense to _me; _I can only imagine what it's like for_ you_."

Fear continued to shiver as she started to timidly play with the tattered hems of her cloak.

"That girl in red you tried to wake up earlier is _Rage._ The reason I didn't want you near her is because _she's_ the reason why _Raven _here," She patted the bed top "—the one you're an image of, and the reason why you're here—is in a great deal of pain."

The girl in black worriedly looked up from Raven to meet Lust's eyes.

"Will she be alright?"

"We hope so. Your friend Knowledge here was trying to put her back to sleep or ease the pain or _something_ of the sort after she woke up in agony. It seems like it worked, but it added a few… side effects; which is where you come in."

"H-how so?"

"I assume you don't know how to use your powers yet, and I _suppose_ I shouldn't be wasting mine, so if you're up for it, we're going to carry your friend to the other room to thaw her out, and introduce you to… well… _mostly_ everyone."

Fear shifted uneasily as she looked down at the now-quiescent Knowledge.

"I promise I won't let them bother you."

"What about Raven? Shouldn't-"

"We'll get someone else to stay and watch her." Lust answered her question, "So are you going to help, or not?"

Fear stood still for a moment before gently nodding her head and pulling her hood up to cover her face. Taking a few steps towards Knowledge's legs, she looked up at Lust long enough for the girl to notice how the jagged edges of her hood created a unique shadow across her face.

"S-sorry I hit you earlier." She sheepishly added as she took hold of the yellow emotion's legs.

Lust's voice softened to the likeness of melted butter as she hooked her arms under Knowledge's.

"It's alright… you were frightened and confused; but I _had_ to get you away from falling prey to that ruse."

* * *

"So how are we supposed to know who these people are?!" Cyborg exclaimed, trying to take out some of his anger over the team's decision on Robin. "Do they wear some sort of _uniform _or at least have some sort of _marking_, or are we just flying blind and labeling _every _citizen of Jump a threat?"

"I don't _know_ Cy." Robin glowered at the metal teen while punching in a code on the door to the interrogation room. "All I know right now is the leader has some 'glowing blue tattoo' on his forehead."

He pushed open the door and found Red X still sitting patiently at the table.

"Well, well, well… you came back. And you brought your little friends. How cute."

Cyborg's face drooped with concern at his leader's last statement.

"Uh… Robin…" He tried to get the Boy Wonder's attention.

"You better cool it, because as of right now, no matter _how_ uneasy they are about it, they're _your_ friends as well."

"That quick, huh? Maybe I should've cut to the chase a little sooner."

"Robin…" Cyborg tapped the boy's shoulder.

"Well… maybe if you hadn't attacked us-" Beast Boy tried to barge in.

"You still have some questions to answer, X" Robin overtook BB's outburst and took a seat, still ignoring the metal teen poking his back.

"Yes, like why you are intending to be on the hero side now." Starfire added in.

"YO BIRD BRAIN! Listen up!" Cyborg finally yelled, tired of being ignored. The room stood silent as everyone turned to face him with questioning looks.

"The pizza guy… he was actin' kinda strange, and he had a blue tattoo on his arm. Come to think of it, he was askin' about our little boy here." He turned to a puzzled Red X. "Sound like one of your buddi-?"

Cy's question was cut short by the howl of the alarm sounding out in the tower.

Red X dropped his head a little in frustration.

"They're already here." The man ground out before looking to Robin for what to do next.

The Boy Wonder stayed stagnant in his chair, staring at the masked man before him.

"Bee?"

"Yeah?"

"Go find his belt."

"On it!"

Robin narrowed his eyes on Red X.

"_You're_ coming with _me_."

There was a slight chuckle, but the man stood up cooperatively, following Robin to the door.

"You got it, kid."

After a few strange looks were cast about the room, the group quickly made their way to the elevator to go see what had triggered the alarm.

* * *

"What the-?"

Brave almost dropped dead the moment she took a step outside the Medical Bay; the moment her foot had touched the ground, the cantankerous claxon to her right had blasted the alarm straight into her ear.

Once she finally convinced herself she hadn't been the one to trigger it, she took in a deep breath of relief and collected herself.

"Well today's certainly turning out to be an eventful joy ride…"

Figuring that it would probably be best to make _sure_ no one saw her in the hall with a giant stash of painkillers, Brave focused on her destination, and carefully sank through the floor in a pool of black.

---

"I'm not sure if I should feel lucky, or like the odds are against me."

She quickly unlatched her cloak, and dumped the painkillers into a nearby drawer.

"I guess I'll just have to hope Raven won't need these before I get back." The girl mused as she shut the drawer.

With everything safely stashed away, Brave made her way to the door, and deftly threw the cloak back over her shoulders; latching it up before she paused in front of the cold metal.

"You've got this." She took a deep breath. "Just act… cool."

"Yo Raven!" Brave practically jumped out of her skin as the changeling started banging on the door right in front of her. "You comin' or what?"

She quickly composed herself, and slid the door open.

"BB-…" 'Crap! Don't use his nickname!' "Gar… do you _really _have to knock so _loud_?"

"Uh…" Beast Boy waveringly answered. "Robin said you might be asleep… so I figured-"

"Well, I'm wide awake now, thanks to you."

The changeling stood in front of her, unsure what to say, and the two fell into an awkward silence.

"The… alarm!" Beast Boy finally came back from his thoughts.

"What's that, boy?" Brave playfully asked. "Timmy's stuck in a well?"

She amusingly watched as he struggled to not only regain his bearings, but figure out what she had meant by her remark.

"H- hey! I'm _not_ Lassie!" He growled.

"Coulda fooled me…" She said coolly as she closed her door and slinked by him down the hall, "I wouldn't've known the difference had you shifted into a dog."

"Bite me." He muttered, as he quickly caught up beside her.

"Where, and how hard?" She retorted, not realizing her mistake until she noticed the changeling had stopped in his tracks. She slowly turned around to face the dumbfounded boy, cursing herself for not only being a bit _too_ bold that time, but more so for using one of Lust's trashy comebacks.

She looked like a deer caught in the headlights, but it failed to register in Beast Boy's mind as he looked up at her. He was too busy trying to figure out if she had just made a joke, or whether she was actually serious about possibly chomping down on him. She _rarely_ joked, and was _always_ serious, so naturally, he couldn't quite shake the latter possibility. To make matters worse, he wouldn't have put it past her to do something strange like that either.

Needless to say, as the two stared at each other in shock and confusion, they fell into yet another awkward silence.

"Hey! You two in a staring contest or sumthin'?" Bumblebee yelled down the hall after exiting the elevator.

The two snapped back to reality, and Beast Boy flushed, while he quickly tried forming a cover.

"C'mon Rae… I said I was sorry."

Brave kept her back to Bumblebee and gave the changeling an inquisitive look.

"For…" She tried to play along while reading his emotions, wondering why he—of all people—was avoiding what had happened instead of making it into a joke.

"Banging on your door so loudly." He replied rather convincingly.

"…And?" She decided to push it, seeing just how far he would go.

'AND?!' Beast Boy yelled in his head. 'I just saved her from embarrassment, and she's giving _me_ a hard time? What the hell!'

"A-and uh… for ummm… calling you Rae?"

Brave held back her smile, but gave him a wink instead.

"Well if the apologies are all over and done with, we've got _bigger_ problems to attend to." The yellow and black teen rolled her eyes and made her way through the doors to the Common Room with a familiar belt in her hand.

Beast Boy just stood dumbfounded. 'Did Raven just _wink_ at me?'

"Nice save there, Beast Boy; who knew you could think that quickly?" 'Raven' quipped, continuing her way on down the hall to where Bumblebee had been.

"Dude! That was _so_ unnecessary." The green teen complained.

"Was it? _You_ were the one who put me on the spot by making up a lie."

"Oh c'mon… It wasn't a _total_ lie; you _were_ mad that I was banging on your door…"

"Yet for some reason, instead of making a joke or shrugging it off… you lied." She turned to the green changeling now walking beside her. "Why?"

Beast Boy gave her and incredulous look.

"If there's _one_ thing I know for certain, it's that if you get embarrassed—_especially_ by me—nothing good ever comes from it."

"So… you'd go against your very character to keep me happy…" She reached forward for the button to the doors.

"Well… when you-"

"…or are you just a coward?"

Beast Boy bit his tongue as the doors to the Common Room slid open.

'I'm _not_ a coward.' He growled in his head. 'I'm just _trying_ to be nice.'

"Guess I'll just go back to my cell again-" Red X called out behind him, as he almost ran into the couple entering the room.

Brave immediately readied herself for a fight.

"Hey there sweetheart. Still mad over our little fight earlier? I didn't see y-" His welcome was cut short when her hand caught his throat, and she slammed him into the floor on his back in one swift movement.

"Raven!" Robin shouted out. "Let him go, he's on our side."

She confusedly looked up to her leader and noticed everyone in the room staring at her.

"What's going on?" She demanded.

"Seems your teammates decided to team up with me without telling you." Red X choked out as she released her grip.

Feeling the guilt building in the room, she realized the villain wasn't lying. Somehow, an enemy had become an ally behind her back.

"What's the alarm for, then?" She finally asked.

Robin turned back to the monitors in front of him.

"Control Freak. He's messing around downtown again."

"Aww man…" Beast Boy whined. "Don't the bad guys know we only schedule one villain a day?"

Brave stood up from her crouched position and watched as Bumblebee carried out exactly what she was thinking of doing herself—giving the green teen a slap up the back of his head.

"Hey!"

"Don't be daft." Bee responded. "Besides, I thought we froze that annoying kid with the Brotherhood of Evil…"

"We did." Cyborg confirmed.

"Well…" Red X sat up on the floor to brush himself off. "Looks like you have your hands full. Like I said before, I guess I'll be heading back down to my-"

"No." Robin stopped him. "If we're going to work together, I need to know we can trust you in battle. You're coming with us."

The man looked over at Robin questioningly before growing a small smile.

"If it'll really make you happy…" He replied and went to get up, but found a blue boot catch him in the chest before pressing him into the floor again.

"Just _don't_ call me sweetheart ever again." Brave menacingly cautioned. "Got it?"

The masked man nodded a curt affirmative.

"_Raven_." He glared up at her, and the two shared a strained moment of agreement before she hesitantly removed her foot.

"I guess you'll be needing _this_ then." Bumblebee handed the man the belt in her hands.

"You're all but too kind…" He searched for her name, but came up blank. "…Goldie."

"Name's 'Bee… Bumblebee." She informed him.

Brave looked on disgustingly at the friendliness between the two.

"Alright, enough with the acquaintances, let's get moving." The blue-garbed teen let out half-annoyed, half-excited to be going to battle.

"You're coming?" Robin asked with a puzzled look on his face.

She turned around with an equally puzzling look.

"Why wouldn't I? Especially if you had Beast Boy come _get_ me."

The Boy Wonder looked on, as his voice started to show some worry.

"I wasn't sure if you'd come though… your powers earlier… are you sure everything will be fine?"

Brave remembered how Raven had left things out here in the real world. Her powers had been out of control and gone completely before she entered Nevermore, which left Brave in a tight spot for an explanation of how she got them back.

"Oh… Right. I just… needed a little meditating. I was really worn out this morning, is all."

"Alright! To the T-Car!" Beast Boy yelled out, and made a break for the door.

Robin scowled at the boy who ruined his cry, but took a breath and went to carry it out anyway.

"Robin?" Starfire piped up.

"Yes, St- Kori?"

"I-… I cannot join you to do battle against the Control Freak."

"Why no-? Oh." Robin hung his head in shame, realizing what she had meant. She was still mad at him, and her powers would no doubt be failing because of it.

Bumblebee took notice of the downtrodden leader, and decided to step in.

"It's okay Star, you can stay here. I'm sure Red X and I will be enough to fill in for ya right now." She gave the girl a wink, and turned expectantly to the Boy Wonder.

"Robin?"

The boy took a deep breath, and set his stance before calling out to everyone except the changeling that had fled down the hall.

"Titans, GO!"

* * *

_**Hmm. Starfire's getting left behind? That poor Tameranian. That's one down, but Red X and 'Bee are ready to Go! :) Brave also looks like she's going to get some real action! Meanwhile, BB gets a little tripped up by 'Raven', and Cyborg is slightly mad about having Red X join the team. Robin on the other hand just seems to keep going down. He gets mad at his teammates, hurts them, and then gets mad at himself for hurting them, and takes out his anger on others! We need to fix that, don't we? Nevermore is a whole other jungle. Raven wakes up, but then gets put back to sleep again by Knowledge who almost freezes everyone to popsicle sticks! We also see a bit more of Fear as she searches the rooms of the girls in her attempt to find Knowledge. **_

_**A lot of stuff has happened, so let me know what you think! Reviews don't only keep me inspired, but they also keep me in check, so I don't go bonkers on any of you. If it is too much for your brain to handle, and you're a bit confused, I'd be glad to try and get you up to speed as well! **_

_**What's next? Well... a thaw-down of Nevermore, and a battle with Control Freak! I would assume.... ;)**_

_**Until next time, **_

_**~VociferousVixenofDarkness**_


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